The Queen of St Canard
by Patricia de Lioncourt
Summary: Canon Divergent AU. Following the events of "Life, the Negaverse, and Everything," when Negaduck made it safely back to Darkwing's St. Canard, things took a turn for the worst. Now, years later, Negaduck rules supreme and there's only one who can stop him—Quiverwing Quack. Too bad she's in over her head.
1. A Whim of Fate

**Warnings** : mentions of previous canon character death  
 **Disclaimer** : I don't own Darkwing Duck or any related character. That all belongs to Disney. Making no money here.  
 **Author's Note** : This is the first in a series of one-shots that I'm envisioning. I'm gonna call this series "The Queen of St. Canard." This was written for both hc-bingo-for the square, fobidden love-and darkpathsbang 2018.

* * *

 **A Whim of Fate**

Gosalyn was sure that life was supposed to have turned out differently for her. She was supposed to, after being adopted by St. Canard's own hero, grow up to become one herself, under her father's watchful eye and tutelage. Well, half of that was right. But things had gone a tad awry.

Sometime around her friend's, Honker Muddlefoot, tenth birthday, her father had gone into an alternate dimension—one that was not only the home of, but ruled by the notorious Negaduck, her father's evil doppelganger. He worked with those he found there to improve the world known as the Negaverse. Negaduck, well and truly pissed, managed to follow Darkwing through into the hero's home dimension, despite Darkwing having pulled the Universal Plug. Negaduck was now blocked from ever returning to his home world and aimed to make Darkwing pay for it. And, in a rather short amount of time, he did. Nearly a year and a half later to the day, what was now known as The Final Battle took place atop St. Canard's highest skyscraper. To everyone's surprise, Darkwing lost. Negaduck killed his foe, destroyed Gizmoduck, and lost no more time in making this St. Canard look like his lost Negaverse's St. Canard.

Years passed. Gosalyn grew up. She trained in those years, and became the Quiverwing Quack. She led a group of rebels against Negaduck's chaotic and tyrannical rule. She had lost her father at eleven and a half years old… and now, at twenty and a half, she was making an almost rookie mistake.

She had gotten a tip on a particular gang of Negaduck's lower-level thugs planning to round up new players in some game they had devised for their Lord's amusement. Gosalyn had heard a lot of rumors of what those games entailed but didn't know what was fact and what was fiction. Only one thing was for certain; it was nothing good. It was a small number of thugs, only three, so she had forgone backup. That had been her mistake—one she preached about. Don't do anything without backup. But she had. And then there had been more… closer to ten. She had been spotted, and now she was running.

She was in St. Canard's downtown, which had been in poor repair when the city was under lawful rule. Now, it was a shamble. She would prefer to take to the rooftops, but their integrity was questionable. She couldn't afford to have one collapse underneath her, possibly trapping her. So, she ran on ground level, ducking and dodging gunfire. She was now three blocks away from the point where she had been spotted, and she had yet to shake her pursuers. She was tiring, and fast. She ducked down behind a long-abandoned car, sticking her head out just long enough to fire off an arrow—one that would create a cloud of smoke. Anything to buy her an advantage. If—no, when—she made it back to HQ, Honker would never let her live this down.

Her arrow landed in the middle of the street, and she could hear the tell-tale coughing of some of the thugs. But not enough of them. She growled a bit, shoving off the car and hauling it farther down the street. She was almost to the corner, and just a few more blocks until she could begin to trust the rooftops again. If she could make it until she could get elevated, she would be home free. Like a second wind, she booked it as hard as possible toward her goal. A moment too late, she saw the large thug step out from around the corner. She dug her heels in the pavement to avoid colliding with the large, beefed-up dog. She reached behind her back into her quiver, thinking to grab the first arrow she found there. Something was better than nothing. But, despite his large size, the brown and black man was faster. He brought his ham hock of a fist down toward her head, and the next thing Gosalyn—or the purple and green clad Quiverwing Quack, as these thugs would see her as—saw was a bright burst of white light and then blackness.

#

She had no idea how long she had been out. But when she came to, she was still surrounded by darkness. She could feel the rough cloth of a bag—probably a burlap one—pulled over her head. She could also feel the tight grip of her mask on her face. That was something. They hadn't immediately unmasked her. Her arms were bound at the wrists behind her back, and her legs at the ankle, and she was thrown over someone's very large shoulder. Beyond the bag, she could hear the loud sounds of what sounded like a party. There was cheering, music, and yelling. The person who had her—the thug that knocked her out, she was guessing—was barely moving. Every so often, he'd shuffle forward a couple of paces and then stop. He was in line. But for what?

"Next!" a voice bellowed.

Gosalyn blinked. Even muffled through burlap, that voice sounded familiar. Her captor shuffled forward some more. The music drowned out anything else, save for when the voice yelled, "Next!" once more. Something about that voice bothered her. As her captor moved closer and closer to it, she began to realize why. Finally, it appeared they were near the front of the line, because she could finally hear snatches of conversation with the voice.

"Useless," he grumbled. "I have all the gold I could want. Why would I want a single coin?"

"B-but it's Scrooge's Number One Dime!" a whining voice said.

Gosalyn scoffed under her breath. No, it most assuredly was not. Being McDuck's personal secretary meant that she knew that dime was safe and sound.

"You were fooled. And now, your stupidity has wasted my time. Into the dungeon."

"No," the wimpy voice protested. "No, please!"

"Next!"

That time, Gosalyn knew she knew that voice. The thug that held her moved forward and given the rumbling in his chest and the volume of his voice, Gosalyn knew he was at the front of the line.

"My Lord Negaduck, as a gift to commemorate the defeat of Darkwing Duck, I offer you this."

Gosalyn felt her body be lifted and unceremoniously dropped until her rump collided with a very solid floor. She let out a hard "oomph" when she hit. Then, the bag was torn from her head, and she blinked against the light. A chorus of gasps filled the room and the music stopped.

"I have caught, for you, the Quiverwing Quack!"

Gosalyn ignored the thug, instead turning toward the person he addressed. Still wearing his signature crimson, yellow, and black suit and seated upon a throne—an honest to God _throne_ —was Negaduck. The room, as Gosalyn was now seeing, was filled to the brim with the worst of the worst and their henchmen and whatever thugs had made their way to this party. Judging by what she could see out of the little bit of window she could peek of in the distance, they were in the central skyscraper of St. Canard—the one her father had died on and Negaduck's center of command. She turned, looking up at Negaduck, who had scooted forward until he sat on the edge of his seat. His dark eyes were locked upon her. He shoved himself to his feet and stalked down the small dais to where she sat.

She wanted to stand. She wanted to fight. But she was bound, captured. She was the leader of the resistance. She knew what was coming—her death, likely by chainsaw.

"Unmask her!" cried a voice from the back, followed by a cheer.

The crowd began to chant it over and over, and Gosalyn's heart thudded in her chest. She was Scrooge McDuck's secretary, and a well-known face because of it. The entire resistance would crumble if her identity were revealed. Meanwhile, Negaduck glared down upon her. Then, he straightened, glaring out at the crowd.

"Do any of you knobs think you are worthy of knowing who she really is?" he asked.

There was no reply. In a room that was once deafeningly loud, now a pin could be heard if dropped. Negaduck stooped, grabbed the ropes that bound her wrists, and addressed the crowd again.

"The lady and I have much to discuss. Enjoy the party," he said, turning toward the back of the large room.

"B-but, sir, I brought her…" the large thug said as Negaduck began to drag her toward a door behind his throne.

The Mallard Menace stopped. He turned, grinning at the thug. "Yes, Domino. Good boy."

Negaduck resumed dragging her until he reached a door. He kicked it open, dragged her inside, and slammed it shut behind them. It wasn't a small room they were in, just smaller than the previous one. It had no windows, though Gosalyn suspected this was a change made after Negaduck's take-over. On the far wall was a large, messy four-poster bed, and Gosalyn was suddenly aware of the whoops and cheers that were happening outside of the door. Her breathing stopped as she feared the worst. However, Negaduck dragged her over to a pair of sofas that set just in front of the bed, facing one another with a small, round coffee table set between them. He tossed her on the one to the left while he moved toward a small cabinet behind the one on the right. Gosalyn righted herself in the seat as best she could, working furiously to see if she could reach the knot of the ropes on her wrist to untie it. The tinkling sound of glass caught her attention and she looked up as Negaduck put away a large decanter of some sort of alcohol. He turned and grinned mirthlessly at her.

"Don't try it. You don't have any weapons—the smartest thing Domino has ever done, mind you. There're hundreds if not more of my most loyal followers between here and the ground floor. You'd be dead in seconds. So… relax."

He walked around the sofas, setting two glasses about half-full of an amber liquid, down on the table. He grabbed one of her arms and turned her until he could reach her hands easily. In moments, the ropes on her wrists were undone. She rubbed at them as he grabbed up one of the glasses and held it out to her.

She eyed it and him. "You're crazy. I'm not drinking that."

He laughed. "If I wanted you dead, you'd be dead. It's not poisoned. Take it."

He leaned in to her, putting his beak close to her ear. He reached up with his free hand and simultaneously, she felt her mask untie as he whispered, "Gosalyn."

She gasped, and he pulled away. She watched her mask flutter uselessly to her lap. Negaduck was still looming over her, one of the glasses still held out. She stared, wide-eyed, up at him.

"You knew?" she asked.

He shrugged and shook the glass at her once more. She pursed her beak together, a little heat of a blush beginning to color the white feathers of her cheeks. She averted her gaze, just a bit.

"I, um, I'm not old enough," she muttered.

At this, he threw back his head and guffawed. When he had caught his breath, he shoved the thick tumbler glass into one of her hands, and she reflexively wrapped her fingers around it. He made his way over to the other sofa, plopping down into a slouch that somehow managed to not spill a drop of his drink. He turned up the tumbler, looking for all the world like he was gonna down the amber contents within, but he didn't. When the glass was righted again, only a drink of it was missing. He looked over at her, arching a brow. Gosalyn glanced down at the drink in her hands, and she noted that her legs were still tied. Holding the glass in her left hand, she reached down and tugged at the knot in the ropes with her right. She glanced up at Negaduck, waiting to see if he intended to stop her. He looked impatient, so she tugged, and the ropes fell away. Her free hand returned not to her drink but to her mask. She held it limply in her hand, eyeing it.

"How long have you known?" she asked.

"A while. Since you first turned up," he answered.

She blinked, surprised. She hadn't expected a direct answer. He eyed her drink again, and she finally put it to her beak. She turned it up, just enough to catch a sip, and that alone was enough to choke her. He chuckled.

"You never fail to surprise me," he chuckled.

She set the glass on the table in front of her, leaning back to cross her arms over her chest. She glared at the duck across from her.

"How much do you know about me, exactly?"

"Everything, Gos. Once I figured out that Dipwing and I shared more than our good looks, it was all too easy to put together."

She dropped her hands into her laps, squeezing them into fists. "Don't call me that. Don't call _him_ that."

"Hmm. Fine. Once I found all of that out, it was easy. Did _he_ ever tell you about that little, unauthorized trip he took into my homeworld?"

"A little."

Actually, Darkwing had told her everything. He had mentioned the evil Muddlefoots—save for Tank—the curls and pink frills Gosalyn who was Negaduck's ward, the Friendly Four, all of it. He had always said that while he might have trapped his world with Negaduck, at least he had freed the Negaverse from him. He was also always quick to add that while Darkwing Duck was around, Negaduck would never be victorious.

Well… her father wasn't a liar.

"Once I figured out that my doppelganger shared almost exactly my same life, I decided to dig deeper. You have no idea how cosmically unfair the universe is, Gosalyn," Negaduck said, leaning forward in his seat.

"Do tell," she deadpanned.

"Here I had, in my homeworld, this namby-pamby goody two shoes Gosalyn that I got landed with all because I wanted some invention her grandpappy cooked up—that turned out to be a total bust, by the way—while _Darkwing_ had _you_."

Gosalyn's gaze narrowed. There was a lot to unpack in that statement. She wasn't even sure where to start. She decided, after a moment, to start with the less obvious bait.

"The Waddlemeyer Ramrod? It existed in your dimension too?"

He eyed her, obviously taken aback. This was not the thing she was supposed to have latched on to. Gosalyn had learned a lot about crimefighting from watching Darkwing, and a fair bit while being on her own. Body language was important. Negaduck had wanted her to comment on the fact that _she_ was supposedly the superior Gosalyn. He was trying to feed her ego. So, while she was curious about her look alike, she would ignore it for now. All in due time. She wanted to know more about the family her doppelganger had had in this other world.

"I take it they died, like mine did—my parents and my grandfather. You said you dug into us… meaning me too, I take it. How similar were the deaths and the reasons behind them?"

Negaduck took another swig of his drink, never taking his eyes off her. He leaned back in his seat, sighing.

"Close, with subtle differences. First off, your grandpa wasn't the sole inventor of the Ramrod… your dad—your real one—worked pretty closely with him. He and your mom died in a car wreck… close to what happened here."

"Train wreck… here," Gosalyn whispered, and Negaduck nodded.

"And then your grandfather's so-called _accident_ was caused by Bulba, wanting the Ramrod here. In my world… I caused it."

Gosalyn felt her whole body go stiff, and her beak curled into a snarl. "You?"

The Mallard Menace held up a plaintive hand. "There, Gosalyn. _There_ I caused it. Like I said, I had nothing to do with _your_ grandfather's death. That was Bulba, like you and _him_ always thought."

"But you _would_ have, if you had been here!"

She fought to keep control. Control was important. It was part of every early lesson when it came to being a vigilante. But she was also pretty sure control had flown the coop about the same time she had gotten caught. Negaduck shrugged off her anger again, and it took every last strand of control to keep herself from launching over the coffee table and throttling the villain.

"Would-a, could-a, should-a. You know that's not the same as _did_. But, as it was, I got the Ramrod, but _my_ Gosalyn was too stupid to remember the code her grandfather had tried to teach her. So, I got saddled with the kid."

He muttered the word "useless" as he took another drink. Gosalyn, meanwhile, was trying to get her body to relax, even if it was just by a hair. Her back was beginning to ache she was holding it so stiffly.

"Why didn't you just kill her?" she asked.

She didn't like the gleam in the villain's eye as he smiled at her. There was the smallest of upturns at the corners of his beak, as if she was a pet learning a new trick. It angered her… and it scared the living daylights out of her.

"Oh, I thought about it," he mused. "Thought about it every day. But then… Kids are useful, sometimes. They can get into places and hear things that grown-ups don't think twice about saying in front of them. And hey, why not? They're just a dumb kid, right? So… she earned her keep."

She felt instantly sorry for her counterpart in this other world. Gosalyn remembered being angry for a long time at Darkwing for pulling that plug, for being the reason that Negaduck was trapped in their world instead of his own. But… after hearing this… At least this other Gosalyn was free. And, to a point, her dad had been right. _This_ St. Canard could handle Negaduck… They would overcome. She grabbed her drink off the table and sipped at it, fighting every muscle in her face to keep from pulling a face at its burn as it slithered its way down her throat. Negaduck finished his off in the next swallow.

"You should have been mine," he said.

The statement was a simple one, but it made Gosalyn instantly wish she was anywhere but here. Anywhere. There was a predatory gleam in the villain's eyes as he sat forward in his seat. Gosalyn leaned back, pressing against the sofa. She felt cold, and, despite clearly being a prisoner for the last several minutes, she was finally starting to understand the implications of that. Negaduck stood and moved around the coffee table until he was standing over her. He made no other moves, simply to stare down at her. For a long while, neither of them spoke. Finally, Gosalyn couldn't take the silence any longer.

"H-How do you figure?" she inquired.

He grinned, and it reminded her of the images of smiling skulls she used to see around Morgana's house. Morgana, who had vanished shortly after Darkwing had died. But that was definitely a future-Gosalyn problem, and she would have to let her deal with that. Right now, the greatest villain the city had ever seen was smiling at her.

"You are the opposite of the Gosalyn I got landed with in almost every way. You're crude and rude. You're tough. You don't bow or give in without a fight. How many times were you there when I took on your dad here? How many times were you _really_ afraid?"

"Every time," Gosalyn whispered.

He paused, taken aback. Apparently, he had not expected honesty. But she was weaponless, and Negaduck was right about her not being dead yet… if he had wanted her gone, she'd be gone. He let out a small "hmm" and took just the barest of steps back, considering her. So far—and, tragically, not so differently from her father—it seemed that if she kept him talking, she was safest.

"You terrified me. You were sadistic. You wanted nothing but chaos and destruction. You were like… like a natural disaster. No real grand reason to your actions. You just existed to exist."

The silence that followed was like a void, like some great chasm had opened beneath her feet. Then, unbelievably, Negaduck threw back his head and laughed. Gosalyn fought against jumping, proud that she remained as still as stone in her seat. Fluidly, Negaduck slid into the seat next to hers. He threw one arm across the back of the sofa, behind her, and leaned into her space. She had a feeling that pulling away might read as an insult, and she would love to do nothing but hurl insults at the person who had cost her her second family. But she was playing by his rules with absolutely nothing to her advantage. She was at the top of a skyscraper with none of her arrows or her bow. Her cape had been emptied. That Domino thug had even found her buzzsaw buttons on her fingerless gloves. She was completely helpless. Sure, she had her feet and fists… but she wouldn't stand a chance against the horde of villains and thugs outside the door. So she sat, stock still, and stared into Negaduck's dark eyes.

"I knew it was you," he whispered, his breath hot on her face. "I remember. I remember seeing you as a kid, fighting alongside _him_ in the same costume… or, the child's version of it, anyway. Quiverwing Quack. When you resurfaced… I knew."

He snapped his fingers, and this time, Gosalyn did jump. He grinned and tilted his head to the right, indicating some space behind them. She turned, slowly, and saw a television she had not noticed before hanging on the far wall behind her. There was an image frozen on it—it looked like a slideshow had been stopped on a single picture. Gosalyn knew the image. She had seen it countless times on countless news shows. It was her, but as she was now—as Quiverwing—standing, triumphant, amongst some fallen rubble. It was her first outing as an adult crimefighter… her first victory against Negaduck. To this day, she still had no idea where the reporter was that snapped the picture… or if one of her own did it and gave it to the press.

"I was so bored, Gosalyn," Negaduck said, drawing her attention back to the villain. He was even closer to her, if that was possible. "So bored. I had won. You're right. I crave destruction. Chaos. _Fun_. I knew I didn't have the resources to go outside of St. Canard, or at least, not yet. So I was stuck, in this city, ruling it. I was so close to tearing it all apart… and then _you_ appeared."

Gosalyn's heart stopped.

"You appeared, and I knew you. I remembered. I watched you fight, from that moment on. Watched the give and take of our two forces. And, suddenly, I understood. I knew why it was that Fate—or whatever garbage you might believe in—trapped me in this bright and sunny world of hope. You. Join me, Gosalyn."

She swallowed, hard. "You've made me this offer before."

"I have. But not in years."

"What makes this offer different?"

Negaduck's answer was the last thing Gosalyn expected. In a flash, he closed the small distance between them, pressing his beak to hers in a rough, deep, and harsh kiss. Her cry of alarm was muffled, needless to say. The shock of it wore off momentarily as she placed her hands on his chest, shoving off him. She launched to her feet, horrified.

"What the hell was that?" she demanded.

He stood, moving toward her. "You can't deny the similarities between us. The way we… run our respective camps, so to speak."

She snarled. "I'm _nothing_ like you!"

"Aren't you?"

"I'm not a murderer!"

He grinned, wagging a finger at her. "Liar, liar. You've killed plenty of my men."

Her eyes flashed. "That's different! You kill because you enjoy it! I kill to survive! To make sure those I care about survive! You're a monster!"

He reached out and grabbed her arm, tight. For a split second, she thought that she might have finally crossed whatever crazy line had existed during this conversation. He tugged her close, and Gosalyn found herself wondering again about those whoops and hollers she had heard several minutes earlier, when she had first been brought in. Her gaze slipped to the side to eye the messy bed before returning to the villain that held her. He shook his head.

"Like calls to like, Gosalyn. You may not see it now, but you will. You're _mine_ now. You're never leaving this building… Not until you realize the truth."

She had pretty much been scared this entire time. It was something her father had told her once, when she had pestered him about it. He had admitted to her, and only her, that yes, of course he was scared. Every time he went out to protect the city, he was afraid. But that's what bravery was, acting in spite of fear. Gosalyn, like her father had been, was scared every time she led a mission for the rebels. She was no stranger to fear.

But this… being held like _this_ by Negaduck, in the room she was in, in the situation she was in… now, she was terrified. And that was a new feeling. The rebels had no idea where she was, she was sure of that. And, even if they did, they were in no way prepared to extract anybody from Negaduck's personal stronghold. She was well and truly trapped.

Apparently, the source of her fear was clear on her face. Negaduck grinned and shoved her back down on the sofa.

"You're right. I am a monster… but there are certain things I value. Certain… victories."

She snarled at him as he flitted a suggestive glance toward the bed. She shook her head. "You won't win."

He chuckled. "I rule this city like a king. Soon, and with you at my side, I'll be running this whole world. One day—maybe sooner, maybe later—you'll take your place as my queen, both by my side and in my bed. I want no other, and I will have no other. Congratulations, kid. You've done something no other person in either this world or the Negaverse has ever done." He stooped forward and cupped her chin in his hand. "Black as it may be, you've won my heart."

She jerked her head away from him, her heart beating ninety miles an hour. He laughed and reached forward, plucking her mask up. He tossed it to her, and she caught it in one hand.

"Put it back on," he ordered.

She glared at him, unmoving. He arched a brow at her.

"Your identity is my secret. It's my weapon. So, unless you've already given up, put your mask on."

He punctuated this with by putting his thumb and middle finger to his beak and letting out an impossibly loud and shrill whistle. Gosalyn blinked and quickly lifted the mask, tying it just in time for the door to burst open. Three nameless thugs were practically falling over one another to be the first to respond to Negaduck's summons.

"Tie her to that chair," Negaduck growled, indicating a chair in the back-left corner of the room. "She'll be with us for a while."

The three responded with quick "yessirs" and moved to grab Gosalyn. She lost no time, leaping up and over their heads. She moved toward the now unoccupied door, figuring that now was the best—and maybe only—chance for escape she was likely to get. She made it just to the threshold of the door when a powerful, electric shock rocked her body. She cried out and crumpled to the floor. She groaned as three sets of hands grabbed her up and pulled her to the chair. Her arms and legs felt like jelly, and try as she might, she could offer no resistance to the thugs as they bound her, tightly, to the chair. In fact, the ropes seemed to hold her just short of cutting of her circulation.

"Excellent. Get out," Negaduck barked.

Again, it was like a bad comedy act the way they fell over one another to exit the room. They did so, though, slamming the door shut behind them as they went. Negaduck smiled, gesturing toward the door.

"Like that little treat? Had Megavolt install it for me. Guy's a total idiot, but he does know his electricity."

Negaduck grabbed up his tumbler glass and moved back over to the liquor cabinet. He refilled his glass and took a thoughtful sip before sauntering over to where Gosalyn was bound.

"You'll see things my way. I know you will. You're the only one, Gos. You're the only one worthy enough to conquer the world with me. My queen."

She glowered at him, the feeling just now returning to her arms and legs. Her fingers tingled. "Go to hell."

He took another sip of his drink, chuckling. "Get comfy, Gosalyn. You're going to be here forever. You'll see. In the end, I'll win. And then… then you'll get to be the you that you were always meant to be… the you that Dipwing never let you be."

She struggled against the ropes, growling like a rabid animal. "Don't call him that! Don't ever make fun of him! Never!"

Her father's devious double grinned at her. "Oh, Gosalyn, my dearest girl. This is only the beginning."

With that, he downed his drink. He hurled the glass against the far wall, shattering it. Then, without another word, he stalked his way over to the bedroom's door and threw it open. He was met by raucous cheers. He pulled the door shut behind him when he left. And Gosalyn was left there, tied to a chair, struggling in vain, weaponless, and alone. So Negaduck thought he could win her over? That she'd blacken her heart to match his? No, she would never. But she could destroy his empire from the inside out. He was absolutely right when it came to just one regard.

This was only the beginning.


	2. Opportunity Knocks

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Darkwing Duck or any related character. That all belongs to Disney. Making no money here.  
 **Warnings:** Canon Divergent AU, implied sexual talk  
 **Characters/Pairings:** Gosalyn Mallard/Quiverwing Quack, Negaduck, Morgana Macawber  
 **Summary:** Gosalyn asks Negaduck why he hasn't aged since that fateful day when she lost her dad. Negaduck decides to answer not one, but two, long held questions in turn.  
 **Author's Notes:** Written for hc-bingo, using the square "betrayal." See the end for more notes.

* * *

 **Opportunity Knocks**

Gosalyn had lost track of the days. The windows had been boarded up and bricked over in Negaduck's room—which offset his throne room atop St. Canard's tallest skyscraper, she recalled. The outside world was becoming like a fairytale to her. She had been in Negaduck's possession for _that_ long. All in all, though, she couldn't complain. She had definitely been in worse situations. But those situations had seemed escapable… so far, this one was not.

She went largely ignored, tied to a chair in the corner off to the left of his bed. She was still in her Quiverwing costume, mask still on. He fed her. He allowed her to bathe, under his supervision, so as to not short circuit the electric grid that Negaduck could activate from a button in his possession that would prevent her from leaving the room. Or, at least, that's what she told herself as she made him put his back to her, as she washed from a big plastic tub full of lukewarm water. Given how their first meeting had ended, she questioned his motives in watching her as she stood, as undressed as she dared. But he never turned, never sneaked a peek at her. This was a relief, given what she knew.

But his words had held true. However long she'd been stuck as his prisoner, he had yet to make another move on her—save for the whole tied-to-a-chair situation. He barely spoke to her. Mostly, he just eyed her warily, as if he was trying to puzzle her out. Mostly, he barked orders at her. Get up. Sit down. Quiet—for the rare times she gave in and tried to engage _him_. She was so used to him talking, just like… but no… she wouldn't think that. She loath to compare the two, despite appearances.

Which was something she had taken to noticing. She had never really given it any thought, during their first little sit-down. But it had been at least eleven years—give or take several months—since she had last sat face-to-face with the Mallard Menace. Eleven years was a long time. Long enough that she had grown several feet, slimmed, and blossomed into womanhood as that stupidly flowery phrase went. But Negaduck? He looked no different from what he had the night he had won against Darkwing. Sure, he was a little more grizzled, but that was really more of a question of personal care rather than natural aging. When he was asleep—which was rare, it felt—she would stare at him, as if trying to figure out her own little puzzle. She had no good answer. So, she decided she would do that next best thing. She would ask.

"Why haven't you aged?"

Was it morning… or evening? She had no idea, as Negaduck's sleeping schedule was sporadic. He had just blinked awake and was now sitting up, stretching and popping his back. He smacked his beak together, eyeing her as if just remembering that she was there. Or perhaps he was wondering if she had _really_ spoken. She voiced her question again.

"Why haven't you aged? You look the same as you did when… back then."

He eyed her, the same way he had for the past… however long. Finally, he smirked and stood.

"Are you trying to tell me something, Gos? Concerned about certain things that men have to concern themselves with when they get a certain age?"

Was he teasing her? Was he teasing her about what she thought he was teasing her about? She could feel a red-hot heat rise to her cheeks and she pursed her beak together. She looked down at the floor—away from him and his stupid, gloating, smirking mug—and snarled.

"I meant exactly what I asked. No implications," she hissed.

"Hmm."

He walked over to the liquor cabinet, pulled out a decanter, filled a tumbler, and downed in all in one big gulp. He immediately began to fill the glass again. Gosalyn marveled at the apparent strength of his liver—given that this was his usual wake-up routine. He turned, holding the newly refilled glass in one hand, and eyed her. She returned the stare, refusing to break it now that she had regained some figurative footing. After several long moments, he downed the glass, tossing it over his shoulder into the wall—where it collided with a _thunk_ and fell to the floor. He rolled his shoulders and exited the room, greeted on the other side of the doors by the cheers of his court of crooks. Once again, Gosalyn was left alone.

At some point, she dozed off, waking only when she felt something touch her ankle. She heard a soft _snap_ just as her eyes opened. She cracked her neck—which did little to ease the soreness—and then found herself staring at a yellow suit. She started, looking up to see Negaduck looming over her, one end of a chain in hand. But… it didn't look like a normal chain. No, this one looked like it had a switch at the end of its length, and Negaduck held it firmly in his hand.

He reached around her, and after feeling a small tug, her bindings fell away. She gazed up at him. He backed away a step, and she stood as quickly as she dared, immediately aware of the small weight on her right ankle.

"What is this?" she asked, barely above a whisper as Negaduck was about an arm's length away.

"We're going on a field trip," Negaduck explained at normal volumes. He gave a gentle tug on the chain he held. " _This_ is so you don't get any bright ideas."

She could pick-lock an ankle restraint. It was easy. Was this her chance? Was this how she was going to escape? She kept her face straight, not an ounce of emotion flickered across it. However, Negaduck seemed to read her mind. He smirked, a little more wickedly than he had when she had last seen him. His thumb slid over a button on the weird controller attached to the chain and he tapped it, lightly.

Gosalyn cried out, pitching forward as electricity and pain shot through her entire body. Around the cuff, her skin felt as if it had touched fire. Negaduck caught her easily, holding her against him.

"No bright ideas, okay, Gos?" he whispered.

She shoved off him and nodded. He grinned. "Walk."

They exited the bedroom, whoops and hollers of various thugs that filled the throne room greeting her. Negaduck ignored them and they moved out into a lobby, stopping in front of an elevator. Negaduck jammed his thumb into the down button. It took only a second before a _ding_ sounded and the doors slid open. He nudged her inside, they both turned to face the closing doors, and he hit the number fifty-five button—exactly the halfway point in the building.

"Relax," Negaduck said as the elevator began its descent. "Play nice, and I won't hurt you."

She swallowed, hard, but now that they were well and truly alone, no worries about anyone barging in or overhearing, she put voice to a thought that had plagued her since he had kissed her.

"How do I know that you won't grow impatient? You're not exactly known for that little virtue. How do I know that, one night, one day, or whatever you won't just….?"

She expected a vague threat. She expected to be ignored. Instead, she felt his free hand grab her arm and whirl her about. He held her, face to face, and stared right into her eyes.

"I meant what I said," he growled. "I won't until you say so. And no one else will lay a hand on you either, if you're worried. You're _mine_."

She blinked, staring at him with wide eyes. She was holding her breath for reasons she couldn't explain. Finally, he released her, and she stepped back, turning around to face the doors once again. They were at their desired floor in the next second, and it occurred to her that she should have peppered him with her usual hero bravado, and her deeply felt declaration of _that_ never happening. She would never go to him willingly. Never. But he was ushering her out of the elevator and down the hall to the right, and the moment was gone. She hated that he probably took that as some sort of victory over her. And she hated that it felt exactly like that to her.

It looked like they were heading toward a pair of double doors—wooden frames, stained black, with fogged glass in the center of each—at the very end of the hall. Before Negaduck's rule, this room had probably been some sort of conference room—not unlike the several she had been in in her most recent years as McDuck's secretary. She wondered, vaguely, if McDuck wondered after her absence. She was sure her friends in the resistance were, but… Whatever the case, she had made a mistake, and she was more than paying for it.

"Open the doors," Negaduck ordered as she approached them—being a few steps ahead of her leash-keeper.

She grimaced, but her overall curiosity kept her from making any snotty remarks. She reached for the two doors' handles, finding the room unlocked, and pushed them open. They entered into a room occupied mostly by a large conference table—which was colored to match the doors—and a group of bustling women. Cauldrons sat on individual, electric burners on the table, and all the occupants of the room moved carefully about the room, searching for ingredients or barking orders to those standing by a long whiteboard on the far right of the room. Witches. Everyone in this room was a witch. She gazed around at all the women, varying in age and appearance, and then found herself doing a double-take when she reached the whiteboard.

"I've brought a visitor," Negaduck called in that direction.

Gosalyn had to fight from staggering back in shock. The woman—her signature red dress and black beehive hairdo distinguishing even from behind—turned. She put her hand to her beak as she gasped, that little tendril of dress attached to her finger raising with her hand. Gosalyn felt frozen in place.

"Go—Quiverwing Quack," Morgana Macawber breathed. "It's you. It's… It's really _you_."

Gosalyn jumped as Negaduck's voice suddenly sounded right by her ear. "You two are old friends, yeah?" he whispered.

Gosalyn pulled her head a fraction of an inch away from the villain, who chuckled and straightened. Her mind raced. What was Morgana doing here? The answer immediately presented to her was that she was a prisoner, like she herself was. But, upon closer inspection, she saw nothing that indicated that status. There was no chain around her ankle, no other obvious form of restraint. Maybe it was mystical? Maybe one of these other witches had rigged something up.

Morgana rushed over to her, wrapping her in a tight hug, which Gosalyn returned on reflex. Though, to be honest, it was good to see her father's old girlfriend still alive. But… Something felt off. Wrong. Gosalyn's stomach churned along with her mind, questioning and supposing… and each time seeing that something wasn't quite right with most of her guesses.

"What are you doing here?" she finally asked, using her best badass superhero voice.

The other witches in the room seemed to ignore the newcomers. Morgana pressed a hand back to her beak.

"Oh… Oh, dear," she murmured. Turning, she glared at Negaduck. "Why are you doing this? What have I done wrong?"

"This isn't for _you_ ," he growled, yanking on Gosalyn's chain so that she moved. He walked them over to a harness latched to a wall—solid iron, securely fastened—and locked her chain onto it. He detached the part with the button—a handy feature; she really hadn't given Megavolt enough credit—and pocketed it as he added, "I'm proving a point. Now… you two ladies chat. Catch up. I'm sure you'll find you have much to talk about. I'll be right outside when you've finished."

He turned back toward the doors, pausing in the threshold. "This should go without saying but… no funny business."

With that, he left, pulling the doors shut. Gosalyn eyed the witches surrounding them, pausing over the list of stuff and the calculations written on the whiteboard before looking back at Morgana.

"What's going on here?" she asked, still using her superhero voice.

"You don't have to do that," Morgana noted.

Gosalyn took another gaze about the room. Off to the left, a couple of the younger looking witches were testing out a potion that seemed to cause a tiny explosion when dropped. A horrible feeling was settling in on her.

"I think I might have to, actually," she muttered. "Morg… what happened?"

Morgana wrapped her arms about herself, sighing. "That's… both a loaded question and a long story."

Gosalyn jerked a thumb toward the closed doors. "I think that's why he brought me down here."

Morgana grimaced. "Down… So, the rumor was true. When I heard that Quiverwing had been captured… oh, Go—Quiverwing… I feared the worst. Has he… has he _hurt_ you?"

"So… you know. No. He hasn't touched me. I mean, he… he _kissed_ me. But, he stopped. He says—"

Gosalyn was whispering, and Morgana held up a hand, shaking her head. "I know. I know what he probably said. He's being honest about that, by the way. He enjoys the… thrill of victory. And, given how he feels about _you_ … well… I would suppose that whatever he's promised you, you are probably the only person in this whole city who can believe him."

"How do you know that? How he… How are you here? What are you not telling me, Morgana?"

The witch put her back to her, and Gosalyn longed to run around and make her face her. But the chain held her tight, and if the shock built into it was anything like the one built into Negaduck's bedroom door… well…

"Morg!" she demanded.

Morgana glanced over her shoulder. "What do you know? What has he told you?"

"About you? Nothing. I know you vanished shortly after Dad d… shortly after Dad. After that, not a trace. I know because I tried to find you… to make sure you were okay. I knew that that's what Dad would have wanted me to do."

"Oh," she said, and there was a distinct waver to her voice. "Oh. That bastard… He wants _me_ to tell you."

She turned, and Gosalyn could see the tears glistening in her eyes. It felt suddenly like she had tried to digest concrete. She pursed her beak and glanced away, blinking away her own tears.

"You betrayed him, didn't you?"

"No!" Morgana all but shouted. She took a breath and tried again, at more normal volumes, waving off the stares of her compatriots—because that's what all these witches were, Gosalyn realized. Her "team," doing whatever Negaduck requested. "No. I didn't betray your father. I loved Dark. But… when he… when he died, I knew what would happen next. You were a kid, and Gizmoduck never stood a chance against the likes of Negaduck. Never. Negaduck gave me a choice. Join him or suffer the consequences."

"So you joined?" Gosalyn bit out. "You weren't exactly a pushover, Morg. You could've stopped him!"

"No. No, I couldn't. I tried. He came prepared. He had gotten ahold of some magicks that nullified mine. He threatened my family. I… I had no choice."

"You should have fought!" Gosalyn screamed, causing several in the room to jump, including Morgana. She stood at the end of her leash, reaching toward the woman who had backed out of her reach. "Do you know? Do you know how many he's killed? Enslaved? Do you know what it's like out there now? He plans on taking over the world. And you're going to help him. Do you know how many will die?"

"I'm doing the best I can, Gos. I… I am trying for nonviolent solutions. Hypnotism. Mind-control… things like that," Morgana argued.

"That's no better! You're… you're a coward. You were too afraid to leave your family and their lives of crime behind until Dad gave you an excuse and now, what? Did you sleep with Negaduck? Throw yourself on his _mercy_ to escape what the rest of us are having to live with every day?"

At this, Morgana's face darkened as she leaned forward, locking eyes with Gosalyn. "No, I haven't. He doesn't want me, remember? Even if I had wanted to… no. I offered my magical services… nothing more. I am trying to save lives the only way I can… from the inside out. The less violent I make his weaponry, the more are spared from the inevitable war. Do you know that he killed my father, Gosalyn?"

She hissed her name, low enough so only the two of them heard it. Gosalyn blinked, and she searched her heart to find its sympathy. When she figured out that that well had long gone dry, she snarled.

"Good. Now you know how it feels."

Morgana reeled back as if slapped. For a long moment, neither woman said anything. Gosalyn rolled the newly gained information from this day over in her mind, feeling sicker with each go around. Finally, a new truth came over her. The inspiration behind this little trip… the question Gosalyn had asked. She gazed at Morgana, flabbergasted.

"You're keeping him young, aren't you? You've got some kind of spell going on him, right?"

Morgana swallowed hard. "A potion, actually. And it's keeping him stuck at the age at which I gave it to him. One of his demands from early on."

"Then this," Gosalyn gestured to the room around her, indicating the world beyond, "is really all your fault.

"I'm doing the best I can in a bad situation. In time, Gosalyn, you'll see how unbeatable he is."

"No one is unbeatable."

"He beat Darkwing."

"Exactly."

With that, Gosalyn stepped back and rapped on the wall closest to the door. Both doors opened and Negaduck reentered. He grinned at her grimace and at Morgana's tears.

"Did that answer your question, sweetheart?" he asked.

"Get. Me. Out of. Here," she snarled.

"Gladly."

He reattached the button and removed her chain from the wall. Morgana shook her head.

"Bastard," she snapped at him.

He shrugged. "Probably."

He led Gosalyn from the room. The ride back up to his room was silent, and Gosalyn didn't even fight the thugs he summoned to have her tied back to her chair. When they were done, the room emptied—save for her, of course—and when Gosalyn was sure she was alone, she let the tears flow.

* * *

End Notes: I haven't done end notes in a while. Well, this is the second in my little series of one-shots. I honestly don't know when I'll do the third, but I'll try to keep them coming as soon as possible. I have some other things I need to accomplish first. But, while you're waiting, why not review and tell me what questions you have that you'd like to see answered about this new world? I have some ideas about some characters and vaguely about what I want to have happen, but I don't know exactly the little bits and pieces. So… toss me a prompt or two, and I'll give proper credit if I choose to answer it. Thanks so much!


	3. Retribution

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Darkwing Duck or any related character. That all belongs to Disney. Making no money here.  
 **Warnings:** Canon Divergent AU  
 **Author's Notes:** Set within The Queen of St. Canard series. Set after "A Whim of Fate" and "Opportunity Knocks." I hope everyone enjoys this latest offering in this series!

* * *

 **Retribution**

Gosalyn, fully dressed and masked as Quiverwing Quack, but with her red hair still hanging, heavy and damp, out of its usual ponytail, was tied back to her chair by a couple of nameless henchmen. But they must have been relatively trusted henchmen, since they were the same pair that always brought her bath, untied her, waited outside while Negaduck alone waited in the room—back turned to give her some illusion of modesty—and then came back and tied her back to the chair when she was done. After such, they would then take the soiled water away. This was the part they were at now.

Gosalyn had named the two, grimy ducks Joe and Moe in her head. After Joe and Moe had vacated the room, Negaduck approached her and tugged on her ropes, making sure they were nice and tight—but not so that they did her any physical damage. He also took this opportunity to make sure she had not found some sort of something to use as a weapon. This part of their little bathing ritual was becoming redundant. Gosalyn had long given up trying to find a weapon. It was clear that Negaduck had cleared the room of anything that could be useful to her.

"Satisfied?" Gosalyn asked as Negaduck stepped away from her.

She stared up at him, too exhausted to glare. He peered down at her, and if Gosalyn wasn't being driven totally insane by her captivity, she could have sworn she saw a mote of concern in his expression.

"I never thought I would ever say this, but… I think I miss your spirit," he commented.

He said it lightly, obviously expecting a laugh—even if it was an insincere one. She couldn't even muster that. She shook her head.

"How long have I been here?" she asked. "There's no calendar. You don't play the television for me. I can't tell by your, frankly erratic sleep schedule. Just… just tell me how long you've had me trapped in this damn room."

He blinked at her, crossing his arms. She could almost see the wheels in his diabolical mind turning, the gears grinding. Working out if there was any possible way she could use time itself as an advantage on him. She knew that look because, just once in a while, she had seen her father make the same face. It was rare for Darkwing, though, since he rarely thought something so inherently horrible. After all, who was so vicious as to steal time?

Negaduck, pure and simple. She was bone-tired. Sleeping tied upright to a chair was not so much sleep as just being so drained that you lose consciousness for a few hours. Of course, Negaduck had offered to share the bed with her a few times. He had even promised to keep his hands off her until she asked. Always, the same promise. It was the one positive thing about this whole experience. She didn't know much about his so-called declaration of love, but he had held true to his word. He hadn't laid a finger on her in any way that could be deemed inappropriate.

"A month."

She blinked, feeling like she had been slapped. "What?"

"You've been here a month. Give or take a day."

Her mouth and throat felt suddenly desert-dry. Her chest heaved, and it felt like her lungs would not expand to hold the precious oxygen her body so needed. Her eyes stung, ready to spill tears that weren't there. A month. She had been Negaduck's prisoner for a month. What had been going on with her team, her friends, her family? Had they been searching for her? Were they being safe about it, going in pairs—like she ought to have done?

Did they believe her dead?

"You're exhausted, Gosalyn," Negaduck said, yanking her thoughts back to the all too terrible present. "I can't trust you unbound, but I could tie you to the bed. Let you get some decent sleep."

"If you loved me, you'd let me go," she murmured.

She was always careful not to throw the L word around too much with him. The reactions were always unpredictable. Sometimes he looked as if it caused him physical pain to hear it, while other times he responded with an almost instantaneous rage. And then, occasionally, he reacted like a normal person should when confronted with the emotion. He acted like it was a gift. He would speak to her almost reverently. This time, he flinched. Then, taking just a half a step forward, he cupped her beak in his hand, forcing her to lock eyes with him.

"I know the cliché. And it's never worked for me. What I love… it never comes back."

Before she could respond, he let her go, whirled with a flourish of his black cape, and left the room. Gosalyn, shocked, could only stare after him. The idea that Negaduck loved her was unusual. The idea that Negaduck had loved anything ever was something worth studying. The idea that it had happened more than once was pure insanity.

Gosalyn was sure her brain had chewed over that one for at least an hour, if not longer, when the door's lock clicked. Confused, she watched as the knob turned. It was far too early for the Mallard Menace to have returned, and Gosalyn was sure he was the only one with the key to the room.

The door opened just wide enough to allow the new arrival to slide inside, which was saying something. The duck that entered was a huge slab of meat of a being, with arms so muscled that they seemed to be constantly held just slightly aloft from his body. He was tall too, at least a couple of heads taller than Negaduck, which made him about three heads taller than Gosalyn—were she standing. His feathers were a dusty brown, his beak short and stubby. His eyes, a dark hunter's green—almost to the point of being black, seemed to pinpoint onto her. Her bonds already had her seated rigidly in the chair, but if it was possible, she straightened more. Alarms rang in her very trained head. Something was off.

"What does his Lordship want?" she deadpanned, playing it cool.

The beefy duck approaching her snarled softly. It seemed that her instincts had been right about this encounter… though she had sorely wished that it had gone the opposite direction. She narrowed her masked gaze into a glare, curling her beak into a snarl of its own.

"What are you doing here? Who are you? Negaduck is very picky about who gets to come in here to gawp at the Quiverwing Quack. Answer me!"

She threw her body against their bonds, managing only a tiny _thump_ —barely audible through the door of the room, she figured—of the chair against the floor. But something she had said seemed to have caught her unwanted and thoroughly unexpected visitor. He paused, the look of rage and disgust deepening on his features.

"You don't know me… but you knew Vinny."

His voice, predictably, was deep and reverberating. Gosalyn could practically feel his words as well as hear them. She stared up at him.

"Vinny?"

"Vinny the Viper," the newcomer snapped.

That did have the ring of familiarity to it. But, ever since the death of her father, every Tom, Dick, and Harry criminal was giving themselves names they figured to be cool or intimidating. She muttered the name, looking down as she let her brain rummage though itself. Vinny the Viper… Vinny the Viper. Suddenly, an image flashed before her mind's eye. Another duck, with white feathers, just as beefy as her visitor, fighting with a group of thugs against Quiverwing and her back-up one evening long ago. Vinny had tried to pop a shot off at Honker—dressed as the Arrow Kid—and to save him, Gosalyn had engaged in a one-on-one with Vinny. Vinny, who refused to stay down, lost the only way he saw it fit to lose. Quiverwing had killed him, to save her group. Now, she looked back to the slab looming over her.

"I remember," she murmured.

He was nodding. "Yeah. Yeah, you remember. Good for you. But Vinny's still dead. And you're the boss's bestest pet. Well, that ain't good enough for me."

To say that she was at a disadvantage was an understatement. She was still very securely tied to a chair, weaponless in a room that was deliberately kept weaponless, and this man had probably a hundred or more pounds on her. Not to mention he was pissed.

"I didn't enjoy killing him. He was trying to hurt my… my friends. He wouldn't stay down. I did what I had to do. I'm sorry it ended that way," she said, openly and honestly.

She never relished the few deaths she had been forced to cause. It was the only thing, she sometimes felt, that kept her separated from the villainous side of things. She knew that, even then, Darkwing would have never approved. Even in the terrible new world that had sprung from his death, he would be disappointed in her choices. She had wept for every death, both because she had caused it and because of her late father's disappointment.

The man closed the distance between them, and his meaty fist rose in the air. She had a second to brace for impact before it connected, a loud _crack_ echoing around the room. She felt something break, but she wasn't sure what it was. The chair wobbled, and her with it, but didn't topple. She shook her head.

"Don't do this," she said, spitting blood.

"This is for Vinny," he replied, landing another blow.

This one was an uppercut, knocking her head back. Her chair lost balance then and fell backwards. Her head collided with the floor, causing her to see stairs for a moment, and her whole body to be jarred violently. She had just enough clear thought in her head to attempt another struggle against her bonds. Her hope was that the blows and the fall had somehow loosened them, but after a second, she learned that this was not the case. They were as taunt as ever. Disgustingly, only one other option presented itself.

"Help!" she screeched at the top of her lungs. "Negaduck!"

The fist he had struck her with opened to land a resounding slap across her face. The inside of her cheek was cut against her teeth, and she could taste more blood filling her mouth. She spat it out, drawing in breath to try again to call for her captor. Her cry was cut off before it could begin as a boot connected with her ribs. She cried out, and the force of the kick took her and the chair over to the side. Tears stung her eyes. She struggled against the damn ropes, a reflex only at this point, as another kick connected with her. And another and another and another. She heard a _snap_ , and pain racked her body. A broken rib… she had had one before. She knew this pain. Then, she felt the man's hand wind itself in her hair and was lifted—chair and all—off the ground. He held her at eye-level, and Gosalyn could see the rage in his eyes. She opened her beak, about to cry out again, but a fresh surge of pain stole her words. The man grinned at her, and she knew that this was it. This was the end. He was going to kill her, because she had taken his friend from him.

By some miracle, the door to the room opened. The man was shocked and turned, allowing Gosalyn to see that Negaduck was the one entering. Upon seeing the visitor in the room, as well as seeing Gosalyn in the state that she was assuredly in, he froze. He entered the room completely and slammed the door shut behind him with his foot. Then, he clasped his hands behind his back. Gosalyn had to admit, he made the position look menacing.

"Larry, what do we have here?"

Well, it was nice that she at least knew his name now. Larry's tongue nervously darted out and wetting his beak. There was a beat of silence, then Gosalyn—chair and all—was tossed aside as Larry reached behind his back to pull free a gun. Gosalyn landed a foot or so back, on her side once more, her view still containing the scene about to play out before her. Larry had freed his Gun, but Negaduck was faster—and his gun was bigger.

"Negaduck, don'—"

Gosalyn never got to finish her protest. Negaduck fired before Larry could even get his fat finger on the trigger of his own weapon. There was a splatter of blood, and Larry's body folded to the floor. Gosalyn figured the shot must have landed right in Larry's heart, but his back had been to her the entire time. Negaduck gave a shout, and Joe and Moe appeared. The Mallard Menace pointed at the now lifeless body of Larry the thug, and the two ran, lifted the body, and hauled it out the door, with Negaduck shutting it behind them.

He moved swiftly to Gosalyn, untying the ropes. She fell completely to the floor as exhaustion and fear overtook her. She didn't even protest when she felt Negaduck work his arms underneath her, lifting her up. In the next moment, they were both seated on the edge of the bed, with Gosalyn leaned right up against his side. The adrenaline of nearly being beaten to death, the fear of it, the guilt of being reminded of the lives she herself had taken, and the relief of being saved at the last minute overwhelmed her. She sobbed, leaning her head unconsciously into Negaduck's shoulder. He shushed her as she gripped his suit, her body wracked with both pain and tears.

"You're okay," he muttered. "You're all right."

"You s-s-saved me," she cried.

"I did. He's dead. Won't be coming by again," he said.

"S-s-shouldn't have k-k-killed him."

Negaduck gently moved her face until she stared up at him. "He _hurt_ you. He got off too easy, if you ask me."

By God… did he really mean it? Did he really love her like _that_? Up until this point, she had honestly just assumed that the villain was confusing lust for love. But… that comment he had made before leaving her, and now this. With a blink, she realized they were still staring at one another. With another blink, she realized they were both seated on the one place in the room she had been avoiding like the plague—the bed. Negaduck's brow furrowed, and it looked like he was struggling internally with something. Then, slowly, he leaned forward and pressed a gentle kiss to her beak. She made no move to encourage it.

But she didn't break it either. He ended it, eyeing her, and it looked like he was silently asking her a question. Gosalyn had a feeling she knew what it was. And the fact that she hadn't even felt the need to slap him yet frightened her. So, leaning slowly away, she motioned to her side.

"He-he broke a rib or two," she sniffled.

"Morgana can heal it," he said, his voice a little raspier than usual.

Gosalyn's body felt strange, almost like it wasn't quite her own. The blows she had taken to her head must have been worse than she thought, because suddenly all of _this_ —the kiss, him, _the bed_ —didn't seem too bad. She shook her head, trying to shake the thoughts out, and scrambled for anything else she could grasp.

"I thought you kept your door locked?" she asked.

Negaduck was leaning toward her again. Inside, it felt like all her vital organs were shaking and becoming liquid.

"He must've gotten the key somehow," he whispered.

He was close to her again. Another fraction of an inch or so and he could easily kiss her again.

"I thought you were kind of super careful with it?" she said, huffing out a laugh.

He chuckled with her, and Gosalyn knew she was going to have to make a decision on this situation soon. Then, her brain replayed her last sentence for her. Now, her brow furrowed.

"How could he have possibly gotten the key? You _are_ careful with it. Because you don't want anyone else to find out who I really am."

He paused. Gosalyn searched his eyes.

"Must have dropped it," he said.

She shook her head. "You would never."

He leaned back, and the truth dawned upon other. She shoved at him, though he kept a tight hold on one of her arms. Also, she was pretty beaten up, so she really couldn't put up much of a fight.

"You're sick! Sick! You… you _planned this_! You wanted to orchestrate a situation where you could _save_ me, so I'd want to… want to…"

She looked at the bed, horrified. She tried to yank her arm out of his hold, but she was too weak from the beating. Negaduck shook his head.

"You felt something. I know you did. You might not have known quite what it was… but you did feel something," he said.

"That wasn't real! None of this was!"

"Wasn't it? You were still beaten. He still could have killed you."

Gosalyn snarled. " _This_ will _never_ happen. Never."

Negaduck sighed. He stood, still maintaining the grip on her arm. He whistled, and again Joe and Moe appeared.

"Rope. And get Morgana up here. NOW!" he ordered. Once they were gone, he turned back to Gosalyn, adding, "I'm restraining you to the bed."

She paled. "No. I told you—"

He tightened his grip, digging his nails in, and she winced—which caused her more pain, due to the break and the state of her face. "I've told you, time and again. I won't until you are willing. But never forget that _I_ am the ruler here. I want you comfortable, and I'm sure Morgana will agree that a bed will be better for you. I'll have her magic up the ropes, just to make sure."

Gosalyn shook her head. "You won't force me, but you'll orchestrate something like what happened here?"

He shrugged. "No different than orchestrating a first date. Besides, I'm not the one who killed Vinny, pissing off Larry."

Gosalyn blinked, taken aback. When the goons returned, both with rope and Morgana in tow, she made no move to struggle. Morgana magicked the ropes into a chain that connected Gosalyn's right ankle to the bottom right post of the bed. Then, she made quick work Gosalyn's wounds. She didn't speak to her, and Gosalyn was cold in return. At the end of it, the young woman watched as the witch handed Negaduck another key.

"That chain, no matter what she does, won't come off without that key. I've made sure of it."

"Fine work. Now get outta here. I'm tired."

Morgana bowed her head, spared Gosalyn a single look, then left. Gosalyn hugged the edge of her side of the bed as Negaduck plopped down on the opposite side. He put his back to her and was snoring in moments. Gosalyn stared in wonder at him. Then, her body, exhausted not only from her ordeal but from days of sleeping in a chair, betrayed her.

She slept like the dead.


	4. Bury a Friend

**Author Note:** Title based on the Billie Eilish song of the same name.

 **Bury a Friend**

Apparently, the squeaky wheel really did get the grease. Gosalyn, still chained to the bed, had been given a couple of concessions by Negaduck. She dared not think of them as gestures of good faith, but… They sure as hell made a difference.

Firstly, he had let Morgana lengthen the chain, allowing Gosalyn to walk around a small perimeter about the bed. It could still only be removed from either her or the bed by that key that Negaduck kept on him. So since he, obviously, wasn't going to be letting her go any time soon, he gave her one other thing. The remote to the damn television. Gosalyn had tried, and failed, to hide her astonishment from the Mallard Menace. She had even shocked herself in thanking him—and not being sarcastic about it. He had shrugged it off, leaving her alone for the day—as per the usual.

She had looked like a woman possessed those first few days. She flipped tirelessly between channels, soaking up as much news as she could. McDuck had launched a new security force in Duckburg—to assure its citizens that what happened to St. Canard would never happen there. Gosalyn was proud to see that it was a roaring success, as she had had a hand in designing it—as Quiverwing, of course. Her resistance was still going strong in the city. And… there were no reports of her.

Sure, maybe it was a tad arrogant to be looking for news on yourself. But she had been missing for a month—a month and two weeks, she realized once she caught the date on one of the news shows. Maybe she had just missed the hype? Maybe… maybe they really did all think her dead. That was a sobering thought. She wondered, vaguely, if this was how those lost on uncharted islands or on hikes felt.

Gosalyn kept the television on nearly twenty-four hours, only shutting it off when Negaduck growled that he couldn't sleep. She had snapped back that she was surprised he could even hear it over his snores.

Yes, they were still sharing the bed.

He had responded by threatening the death of the remote. She had relented, both angry and ashamed that she did, for fear of losing her new outlet into the world outside Negaduck's tower. Besides, sleep in an actual bed was a luxury her body was finding hard to ignore. So, if he wanted the television off, off it went. Those were the times she usually slept.

Negaduck spent most days gone, so it wasn't like she didn't have plenty of time to pour over the news. It was on one such day that she finally caught something that made her pause in her channel flipping.

"Sources confirm the body of the Arrow Kid has indeed been found. Out of respect of the family, his true identity will remain out of the media. Our city mourns another hero, after the nearly two-month long absence of the Quiverwing Quack," said a well-dressed brunette anchorwoman.

Gosalyn forgot how to breathe. Surely, she hadn't heard that correctly. The Arrow Kid's _body_? Honker… Gosalyn's limbs felt numb as she slipped off the bed to stand, partly lean. The anchorwoman was speaking again.

"Other heroes are stepping forward to speak about the Arrow Kid, one's testimony especially heartrending. As we here at WCBN understand it, the heroine known as Blue Steel was romantically involved with Arrow Kid, Quiverwing Quack's known sidekick. We go to the steps of our former city hall as she shares her words."

Blue Steel… had she and Honker been dating? Gosalyn's brain was fuzzy. She did vaguely remember seeing him spending a lot of time with her. Gosalyn had made a joke that her name was funny, and Blue Steel hadn't gotten it. Yes… now that Gosalyn was mulling it over, she did remember. Honker must have been seeing her—real name Cecilia Feathers. The cameras were now focusing in on her, in her metallic, midnight blue outfit, her blonde hair flowing freely in a slight breeze. Her face was hidden by a simple domino mask, the same material as her outfit. Even with the mask, Gosalyn could tell she had been crying.

"When Arrow Kid went missing, in search of his partner, the Quiverwing Quack, we held out hope. Just as we hold out hope that Quiverwing is still with us. But now we can unanimously confirm that the body found on the coast is…"

Blue Steel paused, obviously getting choked up. Gosalyn could see the tears she was fighting so desperately to hold back. Gosalyn was doing the same, despite not being on camera. Her throat hurt from the effort, and her hands were cramping as they reached back and wound themselves in the bedsheets. She shook her head slightly as Blue Steel cleared her throat, silently begging her not to continue. Not to confirm what everyone watching must now know as the truth.

"The body is that of Arrow Kid. We have not confirmed cause of death as of yet, but there are signs of foul play. Arrow Kid did _not_ go down without a fight. And we, my fellow vigilantes and I, have decided not to release his real identity to the public. Not now nor in the future. Thank you."

She turned and launched a grappling hook before any of the reporters could get any closer, skyrocketing upward to the city's rooftops. Gosalyn felt her body shake. Her eyes were burning. Honker Muddlefoot, her best friend since… since she had moved into Avian Way with her dad… her best friend, her confidant, her first love… was dead. Because he had gone looking for _her_.

A fire kindled deep within her chest, and she released it out as a long, loud roar. She whirled, pulling at anything her hands could grasp—which was mostly bedding—and hurled it about the room, raging all the while.

It was all her fault. And it was likely all _his_ fault.

As if summoned by her thoughts alone, Negaduck entered the room. He slammed the door in his usual manner as she whirled on him, eyes blazing. He seemed confused by her at first, until the anchorwoman on the screen repeated the headline for any person just tuning in. The Arrow Kid was dead. With a deep sigh, Negaduck closed his eyes, shaking his head.

"I was going to tell you," he said.

Gosalyn's heart stilled so much that her chest felt hollow. She snarled at him.

"You _knew_? How long?"

Negaduck took a few steps into the room, bent, and retrieved the remote that Gosalyn had had no idea she had hurled. He pointed it at the television and turned it off. He then chucked it onto the couch. He shrugged.

"A day. Two at the most."

Gosalyn leaned on the same post of the bed her chain was attached to. Her breathing was heavy, and no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't slow it. He had known for that long. _For that long_! There was, of course, another, inevitable question.

"Was it you?" she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

Negaduck eyed her for a moment. "Are you asking if I personally killed him? If so, then the answer is no. But if you mean the gang of thugs, then yes. They are one of my gangs. But, really, Gosalyn, all the gangs in this city are mine."

Gosalyn howled in rage, screaming nonsense as she pulled as hard as she could on the chain around her ankle, putting the full force of her weight behind it. She could feel the metal biting into her flesh, but she didn't care. She continued to pull, and it must have been quite a sight, too, since Negaduck even looked a tad concerned. In a couple of quick strides, he crossed the room, bent, and shoved the key into the lock of her ankle cuff. It dropped away, and Gosalyn stumbled back against the bed. She blinked, shocked to have her freedom suddenly restored. She lost no more time. She leapt over the Mallard Menace, headed for the door. The sharp crackle of electricity stilled her, and she whirled, seeing the tiny remote for the weaponized door in his hand.

"Nuh-uh," he said, wagging a finger at her before placing the door's remote inside his yellow jacket.

Gosalyn growled and made her way around to the decanter of liquor always kept out. She lifted the bottle of it, smashing it down onto the table as hard as she could. Negaduck's eyes were wide. The decanter didn't break, so she lifted it and tried again.

"Gosalyn, stop! Calm down! Breathe!" Negaduck yelled at her.

But she was a force of rage and hatred that wouldn't be tamed. Her best friend was dead, because of her… because of _him_. She was going to make someone pay… and it would be better for all if Negaduck was the one who settled that debt. It took three tries, but she finally managed to shatter the decanter. She lifted the largest piece of glass from the wreckage and held it like a knife. Negaduck shook his head, and, most surprisingly, didn't say a word.

She flew at him, brandishing the broken glass—the edge surprisingly smooth—at him. He ducked under her assault, sweeping a leg out toward hers. But Gosalyn knew this move. It had been one of her father's favorites. She was ready. She hopped over his leg, and he rolled backward to his feet. She stabbed at out the air with one hand and threw punches with the other. Negaduck dodged and blocked every move of hers. She screamed and rampaged, moving less with the grace of battle that she had been taught, and more with the grace of a bull in a china shop. She messed up, punching outwardly too slowly, and Negaduck managed to catch her arm. She swung wildly at him with the broken glass, but he ducked it, putting a palm to her chest and shoving her back.

"Fight back!" she roared. "Fight me!"

"You don't want that," he answered.

She screamed, coming at him harder than before. Still, he threw no returning punches or kicks. He made no move to actually harm her. It was infuriating. Gosalyn wanted a fight. She needed to fight him. She leapt off the side of the bed, aiming a kick at his head. He rolled underneath, and she landed hard—too hard—on the ankle she had injured while yanking on her chain. She grunted, momentarily taking a knee. Negaduck rushed at her, and she shoved herself upright just a moment before he could reach her, bringing her good leg all the way up. She landed a kick right in his chin, knocking him backwards.

She balled up her fist and swung upward, the force of the blow landing causing him to fall back. He managed to catch himself, much as Gosalyn had, by taking to his knee. Gosalyn rushed over to him, holding the tip of the shard of glass to his throat. She tapped the underside of his beak, and he looked up at her. Gosalyn grinned, triumphant in her defeat of the Mallard Menace. That was, until, she caught the look in his eye as he met hers. There was a glint there, just a little something.

He was enjoying this fight. And he found her amusing. She could see it. Nothing of what had just happened, even the blows she had landed on him, had fazed him in the least. She moved, ready to step back and deliver another hit, when he caught her hand, the one with her make-shift weapon. He divested her of it quickly, whirling her about until he had both her arms held tightly behind her back. He shoved her forward, until she was bent over the side of the bed, her face turned and smooshed into the remaining sheets.

She felt him lean forward, putting his beak to her ear. "That was refreshing. I haven't seen that kind of fight in you in a while. We needed this."

That hollow feeling was back in Gosalyn's chest, but for an entirely different reason. She felt the tell-tale sting of tears come to her eyes, and she fought them back. There was no damn way she was gonna give him that kind of satisfaction.

"You're a monster," she muttered.

"I am sorry, for what it's worth, that his death hurts you. As you can probably tell, I really don't want to hurt you."

He let her hands go with a shove, and they immediately rose to rest on either side of her head. Gosalyn didn't move. Vaguely, she knew she should feel fear. Should fear the position she was in and where she was at. But… she didn't. She felt… numb. She felt nothing. Behind her, she both felt and heard when the metal of her ankle cuff was reattached, and then the distant crackle of electricity disappeared with a beep.

"Rest," Negaduck said, and she felt his cape sweep her backside as he turned away from her. "You need it."

Gosalyn dug her hands into the sheets as she heard the door open and slam shut. She was alone. The remote to the television was on the couch, just out of the range of her chain. Gosalyn gasped out a sob, still fighting the tears that were so desperate to go along with it. Honker was gone. Her team was sure she was dead. Her father was long gone… and now her best friend had joined him. Not to mention her biological family. Dully, in the back of her mind, she recalled the words Negaduck had said to her, just before Larry had entered the room and broken her bones.

 _What I love… it never comes back_.

Gosalyn was beginning to understand the sentiment.


	5. Stages

**Rating:** PG  
 **Warnings:** Spoilers for previous one-shots, angsty moments  
 **Disclaimer:** I don't own Darkwing Duck or the images used here.  
 **Author's Note:** This is the fifth entry for The Queen of St. Canard series. This was also written for hc-bingo, using the "hugs" prompt. I'm starting to form a general direction for these one-shots, and I hope everyone's gonna be on board for this. Enjoy!

* * *

 **Stages**

She wasn't sleeping well. Gosalyn, despite being in a bed, was now back to her passing-out-from-being-awake-too-long method of rest. Which, as anyone who had ever done that could attest to, wasn't really rest of any kind. Negaduck was restricting her access to the television. It wasn't a punishment, he was quick to explain, just a measure he was taking. Gosalyn had laughed when he had finished his explanation with "for your health." So, most days, Gosalyn sat upright in the bed, curled in on herself, and staring blankly at the room around her. The pieces of the decanter she had broken to fight Negaduck with were long gone. She was only allowed two hours of television a day, and Negaduck also got to choose what channels she could watch. All of that boiled down to the fact that he had finally taken the remote back from her.

Joe and Moe had come a couple of days after their fight, after she had learned about Honker. They had brought with them their requisite tub of warm water, with Negaduck in tow. When they had left, Negaduck turned his back to her, but Gosalyn hadn't moved. After a minute or two of no sound, Negaduck had threatened to bathe her himself if she didn't get up and do it herself. When she still didn't move, he threatened to put her back in a chair. When she remained frozen like a statue, sitting cross-legged on the bed, he had blanked. He screamed for Joe and Moe, who took the water—both looking confused—and the Mallard Menace had left with them.

Gosalyn remained sitting and aching, every breath hurting her, every thought tormenting her, after they had gone. As far as she was concerned, this was how she could spend the rest of eternity.

#

"She's not sleeping. She's not eating. She's barely even moving!" Negaduck all but shouted as he paced about Morgana's workspace.

Morgana stood behind her cauldron, arms crossed. "She's lost her best friend. She's grieving."

"She's already cried for him!"

Morgana rolled her eyes, and Negaduck let out a little growl. He whirled, ready to remind the witch who the boss was here, when she sighed, rubbing her forehead.

"Haven't you ever lost someone you cared about? Someone you loved?" she asked.

Love. The word made his entire being freeze up. He never knew what to do with it. Parts of him felt like they were dying whenever he thought of it, while other parts of his body seemed desperate to destroy whatever had caused it. But he forced all that down with a huff, thinking deeply.

"Something like that, maybe."

Morgana's eyes widened. Apparently, not the answer she had been expecting. Gosalyn had given him a similar look too, when he had told her that he tended to lose the things he… well… Did everyone think him a machine? Yes, he craved destruction. He craved chaos. He coveted wealth. But he was still flesh and blood.

"O-okay. So… think about that. Th-that loss. Don't you remember how it felt? How devastating it was? I remember… I remember when Dark died."

She was always careful to avoid using any wording that directed the blame where it belonged—right at Negaduck's webbed feet. The Mallard Menace knew it was a coping mechanism so that she wouldn't have to remind herself that she was figuratively sleeping with the enemy. He crossed his arms, waiting for her to continue.

"I cried, but that wasn't all. I hexed so many people. I broke anything I could just to feel some relief. I raged like a wildfire until I was too tired to continue. Then, when I came to you, I was hollow. I was like… like a husk of who I used to be. It wasn't until one of the other witches you recruited recognized me from school that I began to truly heal. She knew my story, and she didn't ask me to tell her. She only gave me a hug. She said nothing else. Just a hug. I swear, I must have held on to her and sobbed for at least thirty minutes. But… but then it was a bit better. It will never be the same, Negaduck, as when Arrow Kid was alive… but it can get better."

Negaduck listened to Morgana's testimonial with a skeptical brow raised. He put his back to the witch, considering her words. Was it really so simple? Was all his Gosalyn needed was a hug? His skin crawled just to think of the word. Gosalyn was always a free spirit, a rambunctious soul who would rather punch than anything else. He whirled back to Morgana and scoffed.

"So one magic hug and it's all better?" he mocked.

She ground her teeth. "Were you even listening? That's exactly the oppos—"

Negaduck waved her words off, turning and heading toward the exit. "I don't know why I bother. I'll figure it out. Ta."

He relished her frustrated scream leaking through the potions' room door as he hit the button for the elevator with a small smile.

#

Gosalyn was standing listlessly beside the bed. She was staring at nothing, though her eyes were pointed toward the black screen of the television. It felt like she had a lump caught in her throat that no amount of coughing and hacking could get rid of, not to mention that her chest felt… strange. It felt both heavy and hollow at the same time. Her brain was a storm of thoughts that all culminated in the same conclusion: "It's your fault." Every single thought she had had for the past several days ended with that sentiment. It was her fault that Honker was dead. If she had just played by the rules, if she had just taken backup, Negaduck wouldn't have her now. And Honker would have never had to go searching for her by himself—breaking the same rule she had broken.

The door opened and slammed shut. In the next moment, Negaduck was growling in annoyance.

"You didn't touch a bite of your food," he said.

Gosalyn blinked, staring over at the bedside table. A small paper plate with a sandwich was sitting there. She hadn't even realized anyone had brought her food. She shrugged.

"I'm not hungry."

Negaduck grabbed the sides of his hat, growling even louder. He let go, taking a deep breath. He strode forward until he was about an arm's length away from her.

"You won't bathe. You won't eat. You aren't sleeping, not really. You're committing the world's slowest suicide, Gosalyn."

"Good," she snapped. "It's no less than what I deserve."

"What?"

The Mallard Menace seemed genuinely shocked by her words. She put her back to him, tired of looking at his face. The concern she kept seeing on it whenever he looked at her sickened her. He didn't deserve to care about her, and she didn't deserve to be cared about.

"Arrow Kid is dead because of me."

"And how do you figure that? Last I heard, it was _my_ fault."

Gosalyn balled her hands into fists. "It is. But… it's mine too. If I hadn't gone off on my own, then _he_ wouldn't have gone off. He would still be alive if I just hadn't been such an idiot. I can't even go to the funeral and tell his parents that I'm sorry… whatever good that would've done."

"I sent flowers."

Negaduck said that last word as if he had had to force it out. Gosalyn whirled, her eyes blazing. She hated that he almost looked hopeful at this.

" _What_?"

"Anonymously, of course. I knew you'd try to fight me again if I sent them as me, and I couldn't very well send them as you… but I thought you'd might… I dunno…"

He muttered the rest of the sentence under his breath. Gosalyn shook her head.

"You're unbelievable," she murmured.

Negaduck took a seat on the end of the bed. "Look, I'm not nice, okay? I'm not good at it. I loathe nice. But I've told you… I've told you how I feel. Honestly, I thought I wouldn't care when I first got the news that Arrow Kid was kaput. I didn't care, honestly. But then… then I saw what it did to you. I don't want you like this anymore. You're in pain, and I don't know how to fix it."

"Well, just stop, okay? Stop trying to fix it. There is no fixing it. He's dead. My best friend is dead. I've lost everyone I've ever loved, and I'm alone, and it's all my fault. "

Negaduck stared at her, a little aghast.

"What?" she snapped at him.

He shook his head. "I can't believe I'm about to admit this… but Morgana was right."

Before Gosalyn could ask what it was he was talking about now, he reached out and grabbed her. She yelled at him to let her go, but her demands went ignored as he pulled her onto the bed. He maneuvered her until he was laying on his side of the bed, and she on hers. Only, instead of having their backs facing one another, like they usually did, Negaduck had his arms wrapped around Gosalyn, pinning her arms to her torso. Her head was a little lower than his, and she wiggled against his hold.

"Let me go!"

He pulled her in tighter. What the hell did he think he was doing?

"I mean it, Negaduck, if you don't let me go—"

He shushed her, holding her as tightly as he could. He moved one of his hands up and rested it against the back of her head, tilting it gently forward until her forehead was resting on his chest.

Oh. It hit her like a ton of bricks. He was hugging her. Negaduck, Mallard Menace and self-proclaimed ruler of St. Canard, was hugging her. Negaduck who hated everything pure and good and kind and fluffy… was _hugging_ _her_. She went limp in his hold.

Then, she was crying. She felt like a crazy person. She hadn't meant to cry. But she was. She was positively sobbing. Negaduck tucked her in closer, stroking the back of her head. She wailed into his chest, and slowly, she felt the lump in her throat start to melt and the pain in her chest begin to lighten.

She had no idea when she had stopped crying, because she had fallen asleep. When she awoke, expecting to still be in Negaduck's arms, she was surprised to find herself alone. She knew she should feel relieved at that, but… she didn't. What she did feel was a bit better. Honker was still gone, but… so was the lump in her throat. And her chest still hurt, but… it hurt just a tiny bit less.

She stretched out and her foot caught something square at her feet. She sat up and found a box resting there. It was black and tied up with a blood red ribbon. She gently pulled at the ribbon and lifted the lid. Inside there were two separate folded notes resting on top of a simple, chain necklace. The necklace was silver and had a gemstone—red, probably a ruby—as its only charm. She arched a brow. It didn't seem quite Negaduck's style. The notes were labeled as "rules" and "read this one first."

She opened the one indicated as the one she should open first and found a messy scrawl inside. It read: "Sorry I left. Business. But I've been working on this for you. Put the necklace on before reading the other note."

Gosalyn blinked. Then, slowly, she lifted the necklace and clasped it behind her neck. As soon as she did, the cuff on her ankle fell away. She gasped aloud. Her whole body twitched, as its first instinct was for her to run, but she fought it. There was a reason she had the second note. She opened it to find Negaduck's handwriting again.

"Thought you might enjoy a bit more freedom. Here's the deal. This necklace won't let you leave the building. It won't let you use weaponry, unless under very special circumstances, and it won't let you send any kind of communication with the outside world. Can't risk it. But you are free to move through this building, and I recommend you do so as Gosalyn, and not QW. That way, I can be sure that my thugs know to keep their mitts off."

He signed it with his name only. Gosalyn stood and moved, slowly, toward the door. No trap sprung. The electric trap didn't activate. Holy crap. Her mind was reeling. Not only had she cried herself to sleep in Negaduck's arms while he hugged her, he had given her a gift.

Her life was getting stranger by the minute. Not to mention, she was also going to have to ask him for a set of civilian clothes. That was going to be a fun conversation. Despite herself, Gosalyn felt herself smile, genuinely, for the first time in months.

Stranger still, her life…


	6. The Beast Inside

**The Beast Inside**

She was Gosalyn, again. Not Quiverwing, just Gosalyn, the girl that had mysteriously appeared at Negaduck's figurative side. The thugs in the building—as she had experimented as soon as Negaduck had brought her the pair of jeans and long purple t-shirt she currently wore—ignored her from lobby to the topmost floor. They gave her side-eye, sure. After all, she could take a wild guess as to why they thought she was here. She had emerged one day from his bedroom, after all. None of them had seemed to put two and two together, that Quiverwing Quack had gone in, but Gosalyn Mallard had come out. Negaduck had explained to her that he had staged, one day while she was sleeping, bringing "her" in the room. Apparently, the "her" he had brought in had been Morgana in a glamour, who had teleported back to her workspace as soon as the door had shut.

So she was free, within limits. She couldn't attack him or his thugs, obviously. Self-defense was her only option. She couldn't leave the building. And she couldn't so much toss a paper note out of the window, let alone call somebody. So Gosalyn adapted. It was the first trademark of a good hero, how well they adapted in tight situations. Whenever Negaduck was out, busy, she was on the move. She slinked in corners, down hallways, and into whatever room that wasn't locked. (She didn't know the security rotation enough to risk picking locks. Plus, she figured that Morgana probably had them all magicked up away.)

She had her hair pulled back in a short ponytail, and mostly, she went unnoticed by the various thugs and sundry of the building. Occasionally, she would get a wolf whistle, or a glare, but no one stopped her. She had no idea what Negaduck had told everyone about her, about who she was to him, but she found that she didn't care. This measure of freedom was the most she had had in months, and it felt like taking her first breath of fresh air. It renewed her hope and gave her a sense of purpose.

It was one such purpose that led her downstairs late one night—she got to see the sky again, even though it was just through a pane of glass. Still, it was better than nothing. She remembered the trip Negaduck had taken her on within the first part of her stay here, and she managed to find her way down to the conference room-turned-witches' hut. She approached the door slowly, expecting some sort of trap. She pressed her ear to the relatively thin barrier. She heard nothing inside, and she tried the handle. To her eternal shock, it was unlocked. She took a hesitant step inside, finding the room both dark and empty.

In this room had to be the key to finally defeating Negaduck. After all, Morgana had done so much for him, including his stop in aging. If there was something powerful enough to bring the Mallard Menace down, it would be in this room.

The large table in the center of the room was still lined with single-eye burners, but they were all off and otherwise unoccupied. It was too dark, even with the little bit of moonlight leaking through the wide glass windows to read whatever might be written on the whiteboard on the left side of the room. Gosalyn turned, hands out like she was suddenly struck blind, and felt her way about the room. She could see some shadows that stood out, like they were darker or something, and she identified each once mentally as she figured out what they were. So far, they were either a chair or a bookcase. It was too dark to peruse the books either, which she mentally cursed at. Her answer was most likely within one of them, but she needed to be able to see which one she was looking for. The thing about that was during the day, it was all but impossible to get in here undetected. The room was filled almost every time she had been here before with witches, save for now, when it was covered in the inky blackness of the night.

She had worked her way to the back of the room, finding not only the far wall and the mounted bar she had been chained to, but also a slatted door. She tried the knob, finding it unlocked as well, as the main door of the conference room began to open. She let out a small, stifled gasp and jumped inside the door she had just found, pulling it closed. It was a crowded storage space that smelled of a variety of spices and musty, and it also held a four-wheeled tv tray, complete with old fashioned box television upon it. She wiggled her fingers in between the tight slats, working them apart wide enough for her to observe the room beyond without being noticeable just as the new arrival snapped their fingers, igniting several candles stashed here and there around the room. It was bright, just not in a florescent way. She still blinked against the sudden light, but when her eyes adjusted, she saw that not one, but two people had entered the room. The doors shut with a slam, and Gosalyn rolled her eyes. She had a guess who at least one of the new arrivals was.

"She is so _infuriating_!" Negaduck growled.

He moved into view, leaning over the long, heavy table that had replaced the old, lightweight (and probably poorly made for spell work) conference table. He placed his hands upon the surface as Gosalyn just barely caught the end of a long-suffering sigh. Beside him, Morgana Macawber stood, arms crossed.

"Let me see if I'm understanding this," the witch said. "You gave her the collar, with the proper limitations that keeps her in the building… and now you're… mad, annoyed?... that she has barely spent any time in the same space as you? Is that about the long and short of it, Negaduck?"

Negaduck let out a little growl, and Gosalyn saw his hat bob up and down in a nod. Morgana let out a disgusted snort. Negaduck's head turned in her direction.

"You're really something, you know that? What, you thought that if you gave the girl a hug and a pretty, magic necklace that she would instantly fall in love with you? That's not how it works. Not to mention that you've not made an effort to spend time with her, either."

Negaduck turned, and even from Gosalyn's place in the storage closet, she could see how tired he looked. He ran a hand down his face, causing his beak to bob momentarily. "Like I _knew_ that gang was gonna demand a bigger cut and then cause a shoot out that lasted days if I said no. Sheesh. Besides, I thought I was giving her 'space.' Isn't that _also_ what you suggested, Morgana?"

A chair scraped and soon all Gosalyn could make out of the witch was the top of her beehive hairdo. She looked like she was leaning a bit toward the table.

"Look, I know that this is… complicated, for someone who is used to just taking what he wants."

"I've never taken—"

"I _know_! Fine. Who's used to taking what he wants _or_ having it freely handed to him. Gosalyn is… a spirited girl, a free soul. She has been as long as I've known her, and Da— _he_ used to say the same of her. You can't expect her to just… forget all that you've done to her. By my cauldron, Negaduck, you've kept the poor thing locked up in your room for nearly half a year now!"

Gosalyn firmly pressed her beak together, letting her eyes go a little unfocused. She had known as much, now having access to not only a television but a very limited freedom of movement. But to see a date and then to hear it stated in such a way felt like two completely different things. She had to stifle her gasp, to keep herself hidden, but she clutched at her heart, which had easily skipped a few beats. Half a year was gone, and so much was different now. Her compatriots must think her long dead, with one of her dearest friends being actually dead. The news reports of the resistance against Negaduck was so… neutral these days. She didn't want her ego to show, but she did seriously wonder if it was falling apart without her and Arrow Kid, the founding members of the fight.

"I _can't_ let her go!" he snapped.

Morgana nodded. "I know that too. I'm just saying… this, _if_ , it is ever going to happen… it'll take time. I mean, have you even considered actually trying to date her?"

Negaduck rubbed at his eyes, growling as if the very organs within his head had offended him. Gosalyn peered through the slats at the Mallard Menace, wondering what it was, exactly, that had made him so tired. Was it this shoot out? Was it the resistance? Or was it her and her continued refusal? A large part of her was smug, no matter the source. If Negaduck was tired, it was likely he could get sloppy. If he got sloppy, it gave the city an advantage.

But there was that other part of her. The part of her that still remembered what it felt like to sob herself to sleep in his arms. That part of her was quiet, but it was there, nonetheless. And it felt sorry for the villain. Gosalyn hated this part of herself. Negaduck didn't deserve her pity or sympathy.

Or, that's what she kept saying.

"You're tired," Morgana said, as if she had been reading the hidden woman's thoughts.

Gosalyn shook her own musings from her head, putting her focus back on the conversation on the other side of the door. Negaduck snorted derisively.

"No? Really? What gave it away?" he drawled.

Morgana stood, crossing her arms. "This… relationship you're pursuing with Gosalyn doesn't exist. Not yet. It might never."

He growled low in his throat, and Morgana raised her hands plaintively. "You won't force her, and believe me, I respect that and agree with it. But… you are a, um… physical person. When was the last time you… _enjoyed_ some time with a woman?"

Gosalyn felt her stomach churn, and she leaned toward the door as Negaduck gave the witch the barest ghost of a smirk.

"You offering, Morgana? I thought that was 'off limits,' hmm?"

He chuckled, and Gosalyn could just barely see the scowl on the witch's face. She schooled the expression back into indifference before asking, "Would you accept?"

Gosalyn suddenly felt like she couldn't breathe. Her heart and stomach hurt, and she could feel that her limbs wanted to move, to shake, to do _something_. She didn't want Negaduck to sleep with her… but she didn't care. Not really. Did she? Her mind warred with itself as Negaduck scoffed.

"It would be tempting," he said, licking his beak as if eyeing a juicy steak. "But no. Not with you."

Morgana gave a small grin. "As I thought. Good thing, since that wasn't what I was offering. I was _offering_ to call Mitzy."

Gosalyn's brow furrowed. Who was Mitzy? This was the first she was hearing the name. Negaduck turned his back to the witch, and Gosalyn withdrew, just a touch, from the door, fearful that something she was doing might be noticeable in spite of the thin area between the slats or the dim-ish lighting. The Mallard Menace drummed his fingers on the table before he finally nodded. Morgana returned it with a singular nod of her own.

"I'll send her right down," she said, exiting the room.

In the supposed solitude of the conference room, Negaduck's shoulders slumped. He glared down at the top of the table, his fingers curling as if to claw at it. Moments later, the door of the room opened again, and Negaduck seemed to shake it all off, turning to face the newcomer.

The woman was young, maybe around Gosalyn's age. She was blonde, her hair was long and full, and she wore a blue dress that stopped at her knees. Her white feathers shined even in the dim light, and she bowed—actually _bowed_ —when she reached Negaduck.

"What can I do for you, Milord?" she asked, not daring to meet his eyes.

Negaduck licked his beak again, and now that hungry look was locked on the girl. "Come here," he said, his voice gruff.

Gosalyn had heard that tone in his voice before, and she knew what it meant. Silently, she mouthed the word "no" over and over, lifting her hands to cover her ears. She turned her head away from the door. She didn't want to see this. She didn't want to hear this. She didn't want _this_.

There was a soft thump, and Gosalyn told herself she wouldn't look, continuing her soft mouthing of "no." This was the last thing in the world she had expected to come upon in her lifetime, and it was certainly the last thing she wanted to see. Her hands shook as they pressed against her ears, the move muffling but not completely erasing the sound from the other side of the door.

She was moaning pleasurably, this Mitzy, while groaning "Milord" and "Lord Negaduck" interchangeably. Gosalyn felt sick. Negaduck was making some sounds of his own, but lower, just barely loud enough for Gosalyn to catch. Gosalyn felt like she was caught in the middle of nightmare. She wanted this to end. She couldn't risk revealing herself, she reasoned. How would Negaduck react to _that_? He had been, thus far by Negaduck standards, pretty kind to her. Something told the young hero that that wouldn't be the case if she revealed her presence.

Her heart thudded against her chest. Her stomach rolled and churned, and her hands were starting to ache with the effort of blocking out the sounds. She wanted him to stop.

That thought alone gave her pause. What did she care, if he slept with this woman or not? Her eyes slid toward the slats. She shook her head at herself. She wouldn't do it. She wouldn't look. She didn't want to see this. She didn't want to see him with _her_. She closed her eyes, willing herself not to lose control. What kind of hero was she if she couldn't even hide in a closet quietly? But her breathing threatened to speed up out of her control the louder Mitzy got. The more she called Negaduck's name, the more Gosalyn wanted to scream.

What was wrong with her?

Completely outside of her own control, she scooted back to the slats and opened her eyes. Her quiet gasp went unheard over Mitzy's moaning. Negaduck had seated the woman up on the table, her skirt hiked up to her thighs, and her sleeves slowly sliding down her shoulders. Negaduck, for his part, only had part of his jacket unbuttoned, his crimson hat fallen to the floor by his feet. Gosalyn's hands fell from her ears to curl into claws, digging into the cheap, thin carpet on the floor.

After a moment of Negaduck doing god-only-knew-what to the girl's neck, he stepped back, looking away from her. She blinked at him, obviously surprised.

"Milord?" she asked softly.

"Get out," he muttered.

Her eyes widened. "D-did I do something wrong?"

"No. Get out."

She looked on the verge of tears, but she nodded. She slipped off the table, her skirt dropping back to its proper length as she held the top part of the dress up. She scurried from the room, and Negaduck, his jacket still partially undone, went back to leaning on the table, glaring at it. Gosalyn, for her part, suddenly felt like she could breathe again. He hadn't gone through with it. And she was… Glad? She told herself it was because she wouldn't have to be subjected to such a display.

But, as it turned out, she was a horrible liar.

Her legs felt cramped, and she stood to stretch, failing to notice the low shelf. She bumped her head, noisily, tripping over something on the floor when she tried to duck out from underneath the shelf. She felt backwards, most of her hitting the back wall as she slid down onto her rump. Her legs were still handing over what appeared to be very tiny, round cauldron. Her eyes closed as she sighed.

She heard the closet door open. She took a breath before she opened her eyes. When she did, she saw that Negaduck was leaning in the threshold, jacket still undone, legs and arms both crossed. He had, however, retrieved his hat. She stared up at him, waiting for his rage. He seemed to be studying her. Finally, with a pointed gaze about the closet, he asked, "Looking for something to topple my empire with?"

She nodded. He huffed, shrugging. "Can't blame you. It's what I would have done."

For a long moment, neither said anything. Gosalyn remained on her bottom, legs still caught over the cauldron, staring up at the Mallard Menace as he stared right back. Finally, he reached out a hand. She paused for a just a second longer before taking it, letting him pull her to her feet and out of the storage closet.

"Let's go to sleep. It's been a long night," he said.

Deep inside, she screamed. She yelled at herself to tell him that she wasn't his to order around. If she didn't want to sleep, she didn't have to. She was an adult. But that voice was so deep inside her mind, it was tiny. She nodded, following him without protest as he led her from the conference room back to his bedroom.


	7. A Difficult Task

**A Difficult Task**

His self-made throne room—which was once a big space filled with cubicles, but nobody here really remembered that (nor cared)—was filled to busting with a bunch of no-good scoundrels, thieves, rogues, and probable murderers. Generally, his kind of people. Each and every one of them vying for the coveted attention of the great Lord Negaduck, Conqueror of St. Canard and Destroyer of Darkwing Duck. Several of the thugs had women on their arms, some looking like they had spent their entire lives around exactly these types of people, while others looked painfully new. Both were possible. It was a brand-new world—had been for the last eleven, soon to be twelve, years. Negaduck ruled supreme in St. Canard, with the rest of planet earth having given up the city for lost. A line was forming in front of his throne, each grizzled thug—most tattooed and scarred, some not, and not a one of them in clean clothes, despite this building's damn on-sight laundry—staring hungrily at their Lord, who sat slumped in his throne, gripping the arms of it so hard that his fingernails had dug into the hardwood.

While all eyes were on Negaduck—who, despite his posture, was impeccable in his usual yellow, crimson, and ebony black costume—Negaduck's own gaze stared past all of them, his eyes sliding to the door off to his right. His court's attendees swam in and out of his view as he continued to glare, sidelong, at it.

"I'm not grantin' any requests tonight," he growled as the first thug—a short duck with a newsboy cap and a holey, striped shirt—approached.

The crowd's only reaction was the dispersing of the line that had formed and the look of disappointment in everyone's eyes. They knew better than to voice such feelings aloud. The last time that had happened, it had not gone well. So they went back to their party, and Negaduck went back to glaring at the door.

He knew Gosalyn was in there. He had been watching it all day. She had been in there, still sleeping softly—her red bangs rising and falling with each adorable snore—when he had left. He cringed at the fact that he thought that anything was… _ugh_ … adorable. Granted, a whole day had passed. He had moved all about his skyscraper-turned-castle-fortress. But he had checked in before taking his current seat, and she had been reclined on the bed, her slender legs stretched out in front of her, crossed at the ankles, flipping idly through the television channels. He wondered if she was still scouring the news channels for anything that might help her defeat him.

Oddly, he thought that was adorable too. Maybe "adorableness" was more subjective than he had originally been led to believe.

He freed his fingernails from the wood of his chair, flicking splintered pieces out from underneath them, before beginning to drum on the arm. A loud roar of laughter erupted from the back corner of the room. He shot the group a glare, which went unnoticed. He returned his gaze to the door, mulling over his very unusual problem.

Well, unusual for _him_. After all, he was Negaduck. He was the Overlord of the Negaverse, Tyrant and King of St. Canard (this one), and the one and only Mallard Menace. The problem that was currently at hand was not one he had ever had before. He blamed Morgana. The witch had gotten into his head with her idiotic, _valid_ argument.

He wanted Gosalyn as his, and all that that statement might entail. But Morgana, the other night in the Spell Room, had made the accurate observation that he had largely held the girl as a hostage, rather than a potential lover. In short, they had never even had a date. Therein lie the problem.

Negaduck didn't "date." At least, not like most people. He certainly didn't go around asking people out. Usually, if a woman wanted to be with him, she made herself known, not the other way around.

His left hand dug deeper into the wood of the chair while his right hand drummed even louder. Morgana was right—though he would deny it to the day he died, if that day ever came, also thanks to the witch. He needed to court her. The thought sent a chill down his spine, and he wasn't sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

But how to go about it? He wasn't a flowers and chocolates kind of guy… and, frankly, Gosalyn wasn't a flowers and chocolates kind of girl. Her interests were wide and varied, and while not all of them matched up with Negaduck's, most did. This was infuriating.

"Milord," said a small voice from the foot of his throne.

He arched a brow, tearing his attention away from his bedroom's door. Mitzy—dressed in a soft pink blouse that hung off her shoulders and a pair of light-colored jeans—bowed deeply, her blonde hair forming a curtain over her face.

"Yeah?" he grunted.

She dared glance up for a moment to meet his eyes before looking quickly away. Her right hand raised to play with a lock of her hair, but not in any way that could be considered coquettish. Instead, it looked like she might twirl it right out of existence if she kept it up.

"I, um… just wanted to… uh… apologize for the other night. If I might have… If I did anything that displease… displeased you."

She sounded on the verge of tears. Oh, please… save him from the tears of this girl. Negaduck could handle a lot, but if Mitzy started sobbing, he was grabbing the nearest henchman to drag her from the room. She seemed to hold it together though, as Negaduck stared down at her.

The other night… precisely three nights ago, when Morgana had given him the _priceless_ advice to date Gosalyn… when he had almost slept with Mitzy… while Gosalyn, unknowingly at the time, was hidden in the closet. He ran a hand down his face.

"You did nothing, Mitz. I had a lot on my mind, that's all."

"Really?" she asked, her doe-eyes staring up in pleading.

He growled. "You're questioning _me_?"

"No! Never, milord!" she squeaked.

"Good. Now, go… have some fun."

She nodded, bowing as she backed away. Negaduck fought the urge to groan. He had slept with Mitzy several times in the past. She was… preferred. But he was glad he hadn't that night, that Gosalyn had been too much in his thoughts. The last thing he would want was Gosalyn having to watch him with another woman. He fought a small grin, trying to keep his face the same grouchy grimace he kept while on the throne, as he remembered how that night had ended. He had offered Gosalyn his hand, and she had taken it. They had come back up to the bedroom and gone to sleep. No fuss, no muss. He had expected a fight from the little heroine, but nothing. He counted that as a victory.

He tossed a cursory glare over at the bedroom door, snarling a bit. It was almost as if he could _feel_ her in there, sitting on the bed and watching television like… like nothing was wrong. Like he wasn't sitting out here, his own mind at war with itself. He longed to scream, but he was a ruthless, merciless leader… not a crazy one.

"My lord!" came a high, shrill screech from the back of the room, preceded just momentarily by the loud banging of the doors.

Negaduck jerked his head back toward the room's entry, watching as a wizened old crone—her gray hair thin and dry, a wart beside her bulbous nose that was almost as big as the nose, and a large hunch—hobbled quickly to the foot of the throne, collapsing more than bowing.

"What?" he demanded.

She huffed and puffed a bit, even coughing a little as she attempted to catch her breath. "P-pr-problem in the, uh… in the Spell Room!" she announced.

Negaduck leaned his head on his hand. "And if this was such a problem, why am I hearing from _you_ instead of Morgana?"

"She's, um, dealing with said problem at the moment, Milord! She sent me directly."

The party had paused, all eyes on the interaction between the grizzled old witch and their Lord and Master. It, honestly, would be a welcome distraction, whatever this problem was. He stood, waving away the eyes of the thugs and henchmen around him.

"Go back to partyin'. If you want something done _right_ …"

Tentatively, hesitantly, everyone turned back to their conversations, games, and whatever else while Negaduck stalked past the witch and out of the throne room. He kept moving until he reached the elevator, jabbing his thumb into the down arrow. The doors opened almost a moment after, and he entered, hitting the correctly numbered floor for the Spell Room. As soon as the elevator doors shut, he sighed, leaning against the back wall of the shaft.

He pressed his hand into his face, dragging it slowly down. Why was this so _hard_? A tiny voice—one that sounded suspiciously like Morgana's—pointed out the obvious reasons: he had held her as a hostage, ran the all the gangs in the city and thus was responsible for her best friend's death, and also directly killed her father eleven, nearly twelve, years ago. But… his thoughts drifted back to the night following his discovery of her, fallen over a cauldron in the Spell Room's storage closet, as well as the night he had held her while she had grieved the loss of her friend. These were not things that Negaduck understood. He had no friends. He grieved very little. He was _not_ an affectionate person. Physical, yes, as Morgana had pointed out. But _loving_ or _affectionate_ or _caring_? These things were not him. Yet, holding her tight in that hug while she sobbed herself to sleep, or when she had rolled over that night after the closet and snuggled closer to him. Something in him throbbed, and it felt strangely nearer his chest rather than… elsewhere. Did he honestly want that? Yes, he had confessed his love—oh, how he wanted to cut out his own tongue at the mere thought of that disgusting word! —to her, and he had not lied. He felt the elevator gently jerk to a stop on his floor, and he righted himself, hitting the back wall once, hard, with the side of his fist. He was a conqueror of not one but two cities, with the world on his horizon. How was this possibly his hardest problem at the moment?

The doors opened with a bright _ding_ , and the sound of _zaps_ , destruction, and various yelled words and sounds reached him. He arched a brow as he exited the elevator, turning toward the Spell Room. Through the fogged glass that was on either side of the double doors, different colors flashed dully, lining up with the _zaps_ he was hearing. A loud crash sounded as a shadow that looked suspiciously like a tentacle moved in the room. He rubbed his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. What had these damn witches cooked up now? When he was a few feet back from the doors, they burst open, and Morgana and a couple of other witches—whose names he didn't know nor care about—came flying through to land at his feet.

"Problem, ladies?" he rumbled above them.

The two unknown witches groaned while Morgana managed to lift her head to stare at him. She lifted her arm and pointed toward the room.

"Ripped a dimension open, accidentally. We shut it, but… something got through."

A roar sounded within the Spell Room. He arched a brow at the once again closed doors.

"Magical?" he asked.

"No," Morgana moaned. "Strong, though."

Negaduck reached within his cape and withdrew his trusty chainsaw. "Not strong enough, I bet."

He approached the doors and kicked them in with one webbed foot. He yanked the cord on his chainsaw, the machine revving and roaring to life. What stared back at him was some kind of large, pink tentacle covered monster that looked like some strange breed of octopus—yet, nothing at all like any octopus he had ever seen. In the left side of the room, a group of witches huddled together, sunk down on their haunches as the creature had apparently marked the Mallard Menace as the larger threat in the room.

It was right.

Some messy work later, the creature was fully dismembered, and the witches were all up and about, vanishing its pieces and blood pools away. Negaduck did a quick wipe down of his chainsaw with a rag as Morgana walked toward him.

"I really hate to say this about such carnage, but… that was impressive."

"Hmm," he grunted, shoving the chainsaw away.

Sure, she wasn't wrong, but to Negaduck it had been a distraction that had been all too momentary. The creature, whatever it had been, was gone, dead, and he still was no further ahead on his own problem. He whirled and exited the Spell Room, his hands clasped behind his back as he went. He was halfway to the elevator with Morgana's voice—which was increasingly becoming grating to him—called his name.

"What?" he snapped, turning.

She crossed her arms over her chest, completely unconcerned with his temper. She was one of the few people in the entire city that refused to add the term "Lord" before his name… Gosalyn and her rebels were the others.

"What's wrong?" she asked.

"What makes you think anything is wrong?" he grumbled.

The corners of her beak ticked up, for a second, in the ghost of a smile. Inwardly, he roared. Were it anyone else, Negaduck would have already dealt with them. But Morgana was valuable. She made herself indispensable. She was smart. As such, she knew that she could afford to push a few more of his buttons than most. She approached until she was a touch less than an arm's length away, her head tilted ever so slightly to the right.

"My witches and I just accidently summoned a creature that did more harm than good for you into your sanctum sanctorum, and you just walked off. If that had happened during a day when you _didn't_ have anything wrong, you would have hacked one of my witches in half just to prove a point to be more careful. You didn't. So… What's wrong, Negaduck?"

He let out a low, rumbling grumble, putting his back to Morgana. He could actually feel her gaze boring into him, so, his hands held stiffly like claws, his shoulders tense, he whirled. He spared a glance behind her to make sure that none of the other witches had joined their boss out in the hall before spouting, "I'm trying to ask Gosalyn on a date!"

Morgana's brows rose so high they disappeared into her beehive. Her arms dropped limply to her sides as she stared at the Tyrant of St. Canard as if she had never seen him before. He snarled.

"So you're…you're taking my advice?" she asked, clearly astonished.

Negaduck rolled his eyes. "Don't get full of yourself. Just this once… I think… and if you tell anyone I said this, I'll deny it and probably toss you all into a barbeque pit for good measure… I think you might have something on this whole situation."

He made his way over to the wall and leaned against it. He longed to slide down it, to wrap his arms about his knees, and to bury his face. But that was not a good look for him. He had tried that, many, many, many years ago. It hadn't served him well then, and he really didn't see how it would serve him now. Morgana moved to remain standing in front of him, a sparkle of concern—real, honest concern—in her eye. He wondered if he should shoot her now or later… Gosalyn probably wouldn't like either option. He growled, yanking down the sides of his hat. He couldn't even _think_ about shooting someone now without wondering how _she_ would feel about it? What was _wrong_ with him?

"I've kept her hostage. I can't let her go. I want to ask her on a date, but… but I want her to _want_ to accept, not just because she literally can't leave the building."

He glanced up to see Morgana's gaze soften, and he held up a finger of warning. "You let out a 'aww,' and it'll be the last sound you ever make."

Morgana held her hands out plaintively. "Fine. So, the situation isn't… ideal."

"Oh, really? Ya think?"

The witch glared at him, and it put him instantly at ease. Morgana wanting to zap him into oblivion, but knowing she never could, was right within his comfort zone. She seemed to mull over her next thought before saying it.

"Okay. This might seem… overly simplified but hear me out. Just ask her."

He blinked. "What?"

He pushed off the wall, standing in his usual hateful hunch. Morgana shrugged.

"Be honest with her. You've been honest with her up until now… for the most part. There was that whole rescue manipulation a while back. But, aside from that, you've told her the truth. So… tell her the truth now. Ask her on a date—whatever that might end up being since she can't leave the building—and explain to her that she has the right to say no, and you won't force it."

His next words actually caused him pain. He whispered them. "What if she _does_ say no?"

Morgana frowned, and the flicker of concern was back. She let out another, slower shrug. "Then… then you'll just have to accept it. I suppose, given the givens, that you'll have the opportunity to ask again later."

He rolled that idea around in his head. He imagined his worst-case scenario. He turned back toward the elevator.

"Get the Spell Room cleaned up, Morg. And if this ever happens again… well, keep in mind someone you could stand to lose."

He stalked away, only catching sight of Morgana's face just before the doors closed. There was a ghost of a smile there, and, oddly, he couldn't even be angry about that. No, now he was resolved. Negaduck feared no one and nothing… not even the girl who owned his heart, locked away in his—their? —bedroom. The elevator dinged on the hall outside of the Throne Room, and he could hear that the party was still going full swing. He busted through the door, and everything came to a screeching halt as every single thug, henchman, and hanger-on turned and bowed. He grinned. Even supreme rulers needed an ego boost now and again.

"Back to partying, sports fans," he shouted.

There was a great cheer, and everyone went back to whatever they were doing before. A path opened for him wherever he walked, and he cleared one right to his bedroom. He paused, just a moment, outside of his door, seconds away from his usual entrance of slamming the door open. This time, though, he grasped the knob and turned it as violently as he could manage without the slam and entered the room. He did shut the door behind him a little hard, just to make himself feel better.

She was still there, sitting on the bed. Her eyes were now on him as she scooted off the bed to stand.

"It's not even dark, according to the clock on the news. Are you seriously coming here to sleep already?" she asked.

He paused, the comment surprising him. Was that really what he did the majority of the times he appeared in the room, just plop right down to sleep? He made a mental note to correct that. Talking to her more often should help his situation too, shouldn't it? Wasn't that what all the relationship saps on the TV said? Communication was key?

"I'm not here to sleep," he said, and when her eyes widened, he quickly added, "I-I-I want to ask you something."

She relaxed, moving so that she was seated upon one of the sofas at the foot of the bed. "I'm not telling you anything about the rebellion."

He wanted to laugh. The rebellion wasn't even a blip on his radar. It might have been, had Gosalyn not gotten herself captured. However, he'd never tell _her_ that. He opted to ignore her statement, taking a seat on the opposite end of the sofa on which she sat.

"I've not lied to you, have I?" he asked.

She blinked. "Um… depends on what you mean. You did send someone in here that beat the crap out of me so that you could have an excuse to rescue me. But, every time I've asked you about something… no. You might be a little long on the answer, but it's always been the truth."

Was no one ever gonna let that one idea he had go? He nodded. "Right. Okay. So, keep that in mind. Gosalyn…. I want to take you out on a date."

She blinked at him again. "Um… out? How?"

He ran a hand down his face. Why in the name of all the bombs in the multiverse was this so damn difficult? "Well, it wouldn't be _out,_ exactly. I want to go on a date. With you. Here, somewhere, in the building. I'll work out the details after your answer, don't worry about it."

He let out a long sigh, turning his gaze from her. He found that made it easier to think. He continued.

"Look… I know that I've… asked some things from you without… without… without really putting in the effort, I suppose. Morgana—and gods am I really growing to hate that woman for her intuition alone—made a point. I've confessed my lo—my feelings for you, expecting you to develop them, but I've given you no reason to. So… I want to date you."

Negaduck turned back toward her. Gosalyn crossed her arms, one brow arched at the Masked Mallard Menace across from her. "And… if I say no?"

He heart stopped, for just a second, but it did. He swallowed. No fear… that was who he was. No. Fear.

"Then it's no. I told you, time and again, I won't force you. Never. But I will never stop asking, either."

Gosalyn leaned back against the arm of sofa. The moment of silence that followed seemed to stretch into a god-awful eternity where he was trapped in a middle school, will-you-go-to-the-dance-with-me version of Hell.

"So… ask me. No explanations. Just… ask," Gosalyn said.

Now it was his turn to blink blankly at her. He shook himself, took a breath, and asked.

"Gosalyn… would you like to go to dinner with me?"

Her beak twitched, as if she was fighting to keep her face neutral. Finally, she nodded.

"Yes."


	8. A Romantic Evening

**A Romantic Evening**

When the selection of three different outfits arrived, Gosalyn wasn't quite sure what to make of it. It seemed Negaduck had been entirely sincere about having dinner with her.

She still didn't know if it was a good thing that she had been sincere about accepting.

But he had sent her three outfits—one a jeans-and-t-shirt look, one a dress, and one a more formal-but-still-with-pants look—and had apparently left Joe (or maybe this one was the one she called Moe?) with instructions to tell him what her choice was. Gosalyn had never been one to obsess over what to wear… well, anywhere, but this time… this one time seemed like it was an important decision. She sneered a bit at the dress. It was nice, simple, and black, but… she just wasn't fond of dresses. And the jeans and t-shirt deal look a little too casual. In the end, she informed Joe-Moe the Henchman that she would wear the third option—which consisted of a golden-yellow blouse and a pair of billowy pants made from a soft fabric that was white with black vertical stripes that varied in width. Joe-Moe took note of her selection and informed her that he would be back at seven that night to escort her to her dinner with Lord Negaduck. Gosalyn checked the time on the television as soon as he was gone to know how long she had. As it turned out, she had a good five hours to kill.

She spent the first two of those hours watching the news, endlessly flipping between channels to get different anchors' opinions on several of the same events happening all over the city. She may have also deliberately skipped over a few reports that were directly mentioning the Mallard Menace. Something told her that if she wanted to even make it to this dinner, she need not listen to them.

At the beginning of the third hour, she took a shower—a luxury afforded to her now, thanks to her mystical little necklace—and dried her hair with the small hairdryer she had practically begged Negaduck to let her have. True, she had spent the better part of an hour trying to figure out how to use the hairdryer to somehow escape when she had first received it. In the end, there was nothing a hairdryer could conceivably do inside the topmost room of a skyscraper when one is wearing a mystical necklace.

Now with hair dry, she still had a good two and a half hours before she actually needed to get dressed. She ended up back on the bed, flipping through channels again. That lasted all of an hour before the door to the room opened. She whipped her attention over to it, brow arched when Morgana—a handled bag in hand—entered the room, shutting the door behind her.

"I thought it might be fun if I helped you get ready for your date," she said, not bothering to wait for Gosalyn's response as she made her way over to the bed and sat.

Gosalyn eyed the bag as if it might contain some sort of weapon, when she knew that it more than likely contained Morgana's collection of cosmetics. The young heroine had never been one for make-up, deeming it more important to use the extra minutes to work on her fighting abilities rather than her eyeliner ones.

"That's… not necessary," she said, scooting back a bit from the witch.

"Nonsense," Morgana said, cracking open the bag.

"I don't really wear make-up, Morgana."

"You do too… just not often. I've seen you in the background of McDuck's press conferences."

Gosalyn pursed her beak. Yes, it was true, she had applied a _minimal_ amount, for appearance's sake. But that wasn't what this moment was about. She curled her legs in, crossing both them and her arms. The fact of the matter was that she wasn't entirely sure she was… comfortable with Morgana playing this role with her.

Helping to get her ready for a date? That sounded like something her Dad would have done… or a mother, had Darkwing ever married. But, instead, Darkwing was dead, Morgana had betrayed him by throwing her lot in with his murderer soon after, and now Gosalyn was going on a date with said murderer. When had her life gotten so insane?

Apparently, some of her turmoil showed on her face, because when she looked back at the witch, Morgana had nothing but sympathy written on her features.

"I know that…. I know that things aren't… _right_ , I guess is the way to say it," she said, pulling out all kinds of beauty products. "I know that you hate me. I know that you are probably questioning everything. But… Oh, Gos, I don't know how to say what I want to say without sounding… defeatist."

Gosalyn unfolded herself, just a touch. "Just say it, Morg. Whatever it is you have to say."

Make-up sorted as much as possible, Morgana lifted her eyes to the young woman across from her.

"As… strange as it may seem, I've never seen Negaduck act the way he does where you're considered. He's not a nice man, Gosalyn, you know that better than most. You know what he is. I know what he is, before I worked for him and even more after. But… when he's with you… he's different."

Gosalyn fought down the boiling rage that churned inside of her, reducing it to only clenching her hands into fists. "So, what? I should forget everything he's done and just play nice? Go on dates with him? _Give in_ to him? Just so he'll be nice _sometimes_?"

Much to Gosalyn's surprise, Morgana vehemently shook her head. "No. Not at all. It's your choice, Gosalyn. Oddly, it's the one thing we can all trust from him. He won't force anything on you, except the fact that he rules this city and will continue to do so. And I'm not asking you to accept anything blindly. I'm just saying… if you do develop feelings… that's okay. And, by all means, stay exactly as you are. Question _everything_ he does. Hold him accountable. Heaven knows no one else does or can. He's the law, Gosalyn… but you can be the order."

It felt as if something had loosened in the younger woman's chest. She blinked at the witch and suddenly felt the overwhelming need to hug her. She quelled this, managing to force a curt nod toward the accumulated cosmetics.

"Nothing too… bright, all right?" Gosalyn said.

Morgana smiled wide. "I was thinking of sticking with a nude palette."

Somehow, doing Gosalyn's make-up turned into the two of them joking about the night ahead, which helped calmed Gosalyn's nerves, and also served to take up all the waiting time. Gosalyn had just slipped into her outfit when a knock sounded at the door. Joe-Moe entered when Gosalyn called, and Morgana stood, gathering her make-up collection.

"Have fun," she sing-songed, passing the henchman to exit the room.

"Are you ready, Miss?" he asked.

Gosalyn darted into the bathroom, insanely positive that something had to be wrong with her outfit. When she was satisfied that everything was fine, she reentered the bedroom and nodded. Joe-Moe motioned out the door.

"This way, then."

Gosalyn exited the room, expecting the normal hustle and bustle of the throne room, only to be shocked to her core. It was empty. Not a single thug, henchman, or hanger-on filled the space. Apparently, her shock was evident, even though Joe-Moe was in the lead.

"Lord Negaduck ordered everyone to clear every space from here to where your dinner is at, so that the two of you wouldn't be disturbed."

She had to admit, it did make her feel a bit easier that there was no one here to see her exit the room, dolled up for a date with the self-appointed Supreme Overlord of St. Canard. No prying eyes to spread rumors which may get back to her old rebel friends. It was like a weight she hadn't even known she was carrying had been lifted. With a more confident step, she followed Joe-Moe out to the elevator, which they took to floor thirty-five. The halls of this floor were empty too, and the henchman led her to a room that had a large door—maybe, in this building's previous incarnation it had been some sort of small hall for parties?

Joe-Moe opened the door for her, sweeping his arm to indicate for her to enter before him. She stared between him and the open door. Was it too late to run? Could she run, if it wasn't? What exactly was expected of her from this date?

Did she _want_ to go in?

With a small, decisive nod, she crossed the threshold into the room. The door shut gently behind her, and Gosalyn's eyes had to blink to adjust to the new lighting. She was used to the bright fluorescents of the rest of the building—excluding, of course, the ones that had burnt out and no one had bothered to have replaced—but the lighting here was very different. Candles, hundreds of candles, stood all about the room on various holders, on tables, and some directly on the polished tiled floor, provided the only light. In the center of the room was a single, round table, perfect for two. It had a white tablecloth, two plates of food, and a single candelabra, complete with red, lit taper candles. Negaduck stood beside the table, dressed as he always was. He grinned when she looked over at him, and he pulled out a chair. Gosalyn crossed the floor quickly, hoping that it didn't look like she was running, and took the proffered seat. Negaduck—who, upon closer inspection looked like he had at least groomed for this—took the seat across from her.

"You look… beautiful," he muttered, staring down at his plate.

Dinner this evening was a steak, roast potatoes, and uncut green beans. Gosalyn noted that beside both of them was a wineglass, filled halfway with a dark red wine—or maybe it only looked dark because of the light… she couldn't tell. She smirked at the Mallard Menace. Her nerves felt like they were on fire, and she went with her go-to method for calming them: making a joke.

"Were you talking to me or the steak?"

Negaduck blinked, looking up at her. He looked on the verge of growling in anger—but when did he not?—but caught the playful look in her eye. He grinned.

"You, of course. But the steak is a close second."

He immediately followed this by picking up his fork and knife and cutting into the meat. Gosalyn's eyes widened when she realized that she, too, had been given a steak knife. Her mind naturally went to escape plans. Negaduck, without looking up, chuckled.

"Please don't insult me by thinking that you could ever dream to defeat me with a _steak knife_."

Gosalyn sighed. This man was a constant aficionado of bombs of all types. The steak knife was practically a kid's plastic juice straw by comparison. She picked up her own utensils and began to cut at her meat.

For a long time, maybe too long, the only sound in the room was the flickering of the small flames of the candles and of the silverware as the two of them ate without conversation. Gosalyn, for a few minutes, wouldn't even look up from her plate. It was… awkward, to say the least. Any other day, she always had something to say to this tyrant. True, most of that was insults, which really didn't seem appropriate here. Surely there was something…

"Steak's good," she muttered lamely.

She was a good superhero, skilled in the art of deduction and disguise. She wasn't even too bad at a little espionage. Why the hell was this so difficult?

"Got a couple of henchmen who figure themselves as chefs. Apparently, they ain't just bragging," Negaduck responded.

Another spell of silence followed, during which Gosalyn was sure she was going crazy. What did one say in this situation? She was on a date with her father's murderer. That sentence played through her head about a dozen or so times. She was crazy. _This_ was crazy.

But then, Morgana's words danced through her head. Most importantly, the part about Negaduck's law and her order. For one to work, they had to be aware of the other one. Gosalyn, aside from his more violent tendencies and his various crimes, knew very little of Negaduck. And she was willing to bet all he knew of her was what either Morgana had told him or what he had seen on the news. This was her chance. She could finally get information, information that no one else on the planet would have. Unbidden, the image of the blonde woman, Mitzy, came to mind. Gosalyn knew where she would start, and she didn't have to justify to anyone why she needed to start there.

"So, what's the story with Mitzy?" she blurted out.

Negaduck spluttered on a drink of wine as Gosalyn hid a wicked grin behind her glass. Coughing, the Mallard Menace stared at her.

"Why do you want to know?"

"You nearly slept with her, despite claiming to be in love with me. Feels like I should know about her."

Negaduck visibly cringed at the word "love," and Gosalyn shook her head. She really did wonder, sometimes, what went on in _his_ head.

"But I didn't sleep with her."

"Not _that_ time. But the way Morg made it sound, you had plenty of times before."

"Back to calling her 'Morg' are we? Did we have a little bit of bonding time?"

Gosalyn ignored him and his stupid smirk. "Don't change the subject. Mitzy is a regular in your bed—so to speak."

"So are you, so to speak," he replied, cheekily.

She ignored that too, knowing that if she rose to every barb thrown, she'd waste this opportunity. "Why?"

Negaduck sighed, setting down his fork and knife. "Clearly, you're not going to drop this."

"Clearly."

"Fine. Mitzy and her older sister, Angie, were kind of… caught up when I took over the city. Angie had practically raised Mitzy, they lived on the poorer side of town, and when all the crooks left to come and join me here, Angie's then boyfriend drug them along."

"He was a criminal, the boyfriend?"

"Most everyone here is, Gos. So, yes. But he was… he was worse than a thug. He was a slob, not really good for anything except bullying Angie. Let's just say… he didn't care about the victory of receiving a 'yes.'"

Gosalyn pursed her beak together. When she didn't comment, Negaduck continued.

"He talked Angie—who protected Mitzy from all of this—into a heist that he and his weren't prepared for. They ended up against the few cops that were left at the time, a couple of heroes too, I think, and left Angie behind. She ended up not making it, thanks to being a living shield for the boyfriend. Well, then the boyfriend turns his eyes to Mitzy. But, by this time, he was a member of my gang. I don't tolerate the kinds of things he wanted to do to that girl. So… I killed him. Made an example out of him. To Mitzy, I saved her—I guess. She was grateful, and she's remained loyal ever since."

"And you're not concerned that you're… using her?"

"Oh, I know I am. But I'm not forcing her. She's free to be with anyone else, or to never return to me. But she worships me."

He shrugged after this, as if to say, "What are ya gonna do?' Gosalyn rolled her eyes.

"I'm sure the ego boost doesn't hurt either, huh?"

He answered with a bite of steak shoved into his mouth and another shrug. Then, after he swallowed, he grinned.

"Okay, I answered your question. It's only fair that you answer one of mine, right?"

Gosalyn cut a potato into a smaller bite, eating it while she considered. "Within certain limitations, yeah, I think so. Didn't think you were so concerned about fairness, though."

"I'm not, but you are. So, now, my question is this: are you jealous of her?"

"Of Mitzy?" the young heroine asked incredulously.

Negaduck grinned. "Why bother asking about her, then? It must have bothered you, in some way. Is it because she's young? She's older than you, by the way, by a few years. Is it the way she looks? Or is it that it's her… and not you?"

"I'm not—"

"Aren't you? You could have asked me about anything. About how I structure my gangs. About what products I'm smuggling. About the weapons I'm building. Hell, Gos, you know I have designs on the world, you could have even asked me about that. But, instead, you asked me about Mitzy."

He was smiling a smug, knowing smile that Gosalyn would have dearly loved to punch right off his face. She forced herself to take another bite of food, still aware of his grin fixed on her like a beacon. Finally, she groaned, tossing her fork and knife down on the mostly empty plate with a loud clatter.

"I don't know, all right? Are you happy? All I know is, when I was in that closet and I thought you were going to sleep with her… I hated it. I didn't want it to happen. I… I don't know if it was because I would have been forced to listen or what, but I was glad when you sent her away."

There was the tiniest light of victory in his eye, and Gosalyn shook her head.

"You _are_ jealous."

He sounded so damned pleased, and Gosalyn wanted to scream—a little at him, but mostly at herself. Suddenly, Negaduck stood, coming around the table. He offered Gosalyn a hand. She eyed it for a moment before finally placing her own hand within it.

"Would it be so horrible… for you to have feelings toward me? To be jealous of her?" he asked.

He sounded… sad. But that was impossible. Negaduck wasn't capable of feeling sadness, she was sure. Rage was his primary default. But when she glanced up into his eyes, it was there, just a bit.

"I don't know. I just… If I have feelings for you, what does that say about me? You killed my father. You are responsible for so many deaths in this city, even that of my best friend. What kind of monster does that make me?"

Again, she expected rage. She expected him to reject her for her words. But, instead, he gently pulled her to her feet.

"You're not a monster, Gos. Me? _I'm_ a monster. I know this. You? You're somewhere… in between. You're good… but not goody-goody. You're bad… but you're most certainly not me. You're like… an antihero. Point being, don't torture yourself. You don't deserve it."

He pulled her close and before she could even register it, they were dancing. His hand was on high on her hip, she had placed one of hers on his shoulder, and they were still clasping hands. He swept her around the room, despite the fact that there was no music. She blinked at him.

"I didn't know you knew how to dance," she murmured.

"I didn't know you could either."

"I… needed to learn. For my day job."

She'd be a poor hero indeed if she spilled all of her secrets in one go. Morgana might know who she worked for, but he didn't need to, but Negaduck smirked.

"As McDuck's secretary? Or whatever your actual title is?"

She blinked at him. He chuckled, adding, "There's not much I don't know about your day-to-day."

"That's a little creepy," she stated, with little conviction.

"Some would find it… _sweet_."

He seemed to struggle on that last word, causing Gosalyn to laugh. She shrugged as he whirled her around and around, dancing to no tune but their own.

"What's so wrong with being nice, Negaduck? Or sweet? Or love? Why do these things bother you so much?"

"Why do they bother you?" he shot back.

"It's _expected_ of me. I'm a girl, remember? Sugar, spice, and everything nice."

Now it was him laughing. "That's a load of crap."

"Yeah, well, it rolls off the tongue better than sports, fighting, and beer-chugging."

They both laughed at that one before he arched a questioning brow. "Beer-chugging?"

"I know how to have fun, you know. I'm not work-work-work all the time."

"Could've fooled me."

"I'm on a date tonight, aren't I?"

He stared at her then, a look Gosalyn didn't recognize crossing his features. She was about to apologize—something she never in a million years thought she'd do to _Negaduck_ —when he grinned.

"Yes. Yes, you are."

"So, how about it? Why are you so against love?"

At this, his face turned a little grim. "I don't wanna talk about it. If it's all the same to you."

"Why?"

He looked like he might snap at her, and maybe Gosalyn was hoping he would. After all, it would be proof that these things she was beginning to feel, this night she was having, was all just a temporary insanity brought on by long-held captivity. But he schooled his features into grim indifference.

"Because it's a part of my past that I just don't like to revisit."

That just made her curiosity grow and gnaw a bit on her insides. But she nodded. She had gotten a bit out of him tonight, much more than she would have ever thought she would have. Baby steps…

"Okay. So, let's talk about something else then. Heroes and villains aside. What's your favorite color, for example?"

"Really? That's what we're starting with?"

"Why not? Mine's green, by the way."

"Black or blood red."

She stared pointedly down at his suit. "Not yellow?"

"Looks good on me, but no. Don't hate it, though."

"All right. Favorite food?"

"Skulls. You?"

"Pepperoni pizza with black olives."

"Black olives? See, I told you that you weren't all good."

She playfully swatted him on the shoulder. "They're good!"

The rest of the night proceeded much in the same manner. One of them would ask an inane question, which would carefully avoid any of their larger issues, and they danced until they were dizzy, sitting to catch their breath and continue their conversation. Eventually, they both grew aware of the late hour, with Gosalyn teasing him that he had a "kingdom to run." It was the closest the two of them had gotten to mentioning the real world in hours. Negaduck seemed not to mind. He escorted Gosalyn from the room.

"What about those candles?" she asked worriedly.

"Morg magicked them to keep 'em from burning the place down. They'll burn out in a couple of hours anyway. Some of my boys will clean up the other mess too."

Gosalyn nodded as the two of them entered the elevator, riding it up to the top floor. They exited, still talking until they reached the door of the bedroom they both shared. It was here that Gosalyn's heart seemed to beat a little faster. Negaduck paused, seeming to almost sense her unease.

"How many times do I have to say it?" he sighed.

"It's not that," Gosalyn said.

"Oh?"

Gosalyn took a deep breath, steeling herself for the explanation that was coming. "Well, you see… I had a good time. I mean, I really doubted it, at first. I thought at best we'd spend all night trading insults, and that I'd be frustrated and angry by the time it was over. But… I'm not. This is the most fun I've had in… ages, maybe even dating back pre-capture."

"But you look like I'm asking you to suck on a lemon. I'm confused," Negaduck replied.

Gosalyn stared down at her feet in order to avoid making eye contact with him. "Normally, at the end of a good date… I'd at least kiss the guy… But…"

She remained determinedly starting downward, waiting for Negaduck's response. After a moment, he reached out and gently lifted her chin. In the next instant, he kissed her. This one lasted a good measure longer than the little peck he had dared back when Larry had nearly beaten her into mush. This time, though, she didn't mind it. In fact, she found her arms moving upward, encircling his neck. He broke the embrace, eyeing her a moment, before kissing her again, deeply. Gosalyn found her body trying to meld into his, and she realized that she really didn't mind that his hands were on her, holding her tightly against him.

An alarm bell rang in her head, and she broke the kiss, looking away. She put a hand on the bedroom door to steady herself, willing her heart to slow to a steadier beat.

"Gosalyn? Was that…?"

"It was good. Really. I just… I'm not… Not yet, I don't know… I can't…"

"Ssh," he shushed her, reaching around her to open the door.

She turned, blinking at him. He motioned for her to enter, with him following after and shutting the door with his usual slam.

"If you want to stop, we'll stop. All there is to it."

"I'm not usually… I'm not the type that would—"

He held up a hand. "You don't have to explain. Would you like to go to sleep?"

She nodded. She couldn't help it. She felt awful. She felt like a tease. She felt like a traitor. It felt like she was being ripped in two. She excused herself to switch into something a bit more comfortable to sleep in—a pair of stretchy yoga pants and a loose t-shirt. She washed her face and hands, exiting the room to find Negaduck already in bed, snoring softly. She was glad for it, since that meant he wouldn't see the soft smile on her face. She went around the bed, crawling in on the other side. She lay on her side, facing away from the Mallard Menace as her brain replayed everything that had happened over the day, between both her and Negaduck and her and Morgana. She felt like she was losing her mind, and that the lines she had once drawn so dark were now blurring. And she had no idea how she felt about _that_.

In his sleep, Negaduck rolled until he had an arm over her. "G'night, Gos," he muttered, placing a kiss against the back of her head.

He was snoring again, but Gosalyn still murmured back, "Good night… Negaduck."

She found herself snuggling a little closer to him, relishing the warmth of his body against hers. And the kiss… she felt herself flush just thinking about it.

He had called her an antihero. She still wondered if monster wasn't the right term for her after all.


	9. Lies We Tell Ourselves

**A/N: Written for LiveJournal's H/C Bingo, Wild Square, "Forced to participate in an illegal/hurtful activity."**

* * *

 **Lies We Tell Ourselves**

Things had changed, subtly, after their date. For one, when Negaduck arrived in the room, it wasn't always about going straight to sleep—like it had been pre-date. Now, he had meals with Gosalyn. He talked with her about everything that they both felt they could safely share with one another. This, of course, left topics concerning his empire and her rebellion off the table.

There were some days that Gosalyn wondered at the way her life was now. She was still captive in Negaduck's skyscraper-turned-fortress, they were still sharing a single sleeping space, and she had already gone on a few dates with the Mallard Menace. Sometimes, at night, guilt tore her apart, sometimes rendering her sleepless. But, in her waking hours, while they sat on the couch, sometimes stealing little kisses here and there, her mind was blissfully blank. They never took it any further than a make-out session, but it would leave her world breathless and spinning.

She tried her best to keep her rational thoughts out of the equation. Especially in moments such as the one she was caught in now, with Negaduck's increasingly familiar weight pressing in on top of her, encircling her, as he kissed her and nibbled at her neck over and over. But, after a while, when her body reached that inevitable moment of choice—will she go through with it this time, or is this all just some sort of perverse survival mechanism?—she let loose a long sigh, turning her head a little too far to be just a suggestion for more necking. Negaduck, to his credit, was always quick to catch the hint. He caught her left cheek in his hand, gently turning her face back toward his for a final kiss. She allowed him this, despite her guilt rearing its ugly head again.

 _He killed your father! He's a heartless monster! And you_ like _his kisses, his touches? What does that make you?_

The voice in her head was screaming, and if it had a physical form, it would be jumping up and down, pounding its webbed feet against the floor of her mind. She sighed as the kiss ended, and they both righted themselves on the couch.

"And what horrible name did you call yourself this time? Or are we sticking with 'monster'?"

Gosalyn stared at the Mallard Menace, a little wide-eyed. This playful, joking Negaduck was a completely new creature to her. She was used to his threats of destruction, his carefully plotted plans for deception, his cleverly crafted insults. But she had given the signal that she was done with their intimacy, and he had backed off. It was almost considerate. Although, she had a feeling that she shouldn't say as much to him. She curled her legs underneath herself, narrowing her eyes at him.

"Very funny."

He shrugged. "I'm hilarious. Most people around me just don't get to live long enough to find out."

She arched a brow at him, and he shrugged again. She rolled her eyes. Resting an elbow on the couch's arm, she propped her head in her hand.

"Monster, if you must know."

Now it was Negaduck's turn to roll his eyes. "You're not a monster, Gos."

"I just had a make-out session with a known dictator and murderer. A murderer, I might add, that I have been personally victimized by."

Negaduck ran a hand down his face. There was a dark, cruel gleam in his eye, and the way held his beak looked like he was just barely holding back a comment. Gosalyn uncurled herself, sitting rigidly across from him.

"Say it," she challenged.

He growled, and the sound was almost a comfort for her. It put her right back on familiar ground. He turned so that he was facing away from her.

"I've got nothin' to say," he grumbled.

Gosalyn was loath to admit this, but sometimes—just sometimes—she hated this new and improved Negaduck more than the old one. She was used to the other one, with his hateful and evil ways. At least she could always get a good row going with him. This new way he acted with her seemed like he was walking on eggshells around her, wary of any word he might say being taken the wrong way. She needed him to go back, just for a while, to the manipulative killer that he was. Then, maybe, she could see sense, see that she was being crazy for even entertaining the idea of being attracted to him.

"I can't just get over it," she muttered.

She was picking, hoping for a fight. She knew it was a dirty, childish tactic, and one that shouldn't even be entertained in a normal relationship. But theirs was one far from normal. She needed the catharsis of a fight. But Negaduck stared determinedly away from her.

"I wasn't going to _say_ anything."

She shifted in her seat. It was like she had an itch she couldn't scratch. That logical voice that had been oh-so vocal earlier, causing her to stop making out with St. Canard's self-proclaimed king, was now urging her to let it go—to not fight. She knew she was probably going crazy, but sometimes she wished her inner her would shut up. She sighed—really more of an aggravated, disgusted groan—and shoved herself to her feet.

"I need to talk to Morg," she said, turning toward the door.

"Gonna be hard to do," he called after her, and if she wasn't mistaken, a touch of that ol' Negaduck-style of perverse glee was in that statement.

Gosalyn stopped, genuine confusion on her face. "Why?"

He stood, stretched his back, and jerked a thumb toward a boarded-up window that would've looked out over the city.

"I have her and a group out on a job. The so-called mayor of this junkyard of a city tried to bring a certain item into that joke of a museum. I have no idea what that knob thought he was doing, but, hey, I also think it's one helluva joke that he's still insistent that he's still the mayor of anything."

Gosalyn crossed her arms, glaring. "He _is_ the mayor, Negs. He was elected. You know, by the people? He didn't feel the need to stomp into town, cause murder and mayhem, and then proclaim himself king of the city. Probably why his approval rating was so high in the first place."

Another "whaddya gonna do" shrug. "His loss. My way is loads more fun."

Gosalyn dug her fingernails into her own flesh, holding on to her own arms for dear life. Oh, if this stupid necklace didn't stop her from using weaponry of any kind… Quiverwing Quack would gladly show this tyrant where exactly he could get off. Instead, she just shook her head.

"So she's at the museum?"

Negaduck nodded and walked over to the television. It had been off for a while, given that neither one of them had been exactly paying attention to it. Gosalyn felt her cheeks redden a touch at that thought, and she tried to tell herself that it was because of the aggravation she was feeling… but every part of her knew that wasn't true. She moved until both she and Negaduck were standing just a foot or so back from the screen, where he grabbed the remote and turned it on. He went into its settings, switching it to a different input port, and suddenly hundreds of tiny little screens webbed itself across the single, large one. Muttering to himself, he scrolled through them until he finally said, "ah, here," and clicked on one. It went full sized, now the focus of the television, and Gosalyn gasped, her brain finally catching on to what her eyes were seeing. She whirled on the Mallard Menace.

"You've got all the security cameras in the city wired to here?" she said, jabbing a finger at the TV.

He grinned, perfectly Cheshire. "Of course I do. I wasn't born yesterday."

Her face flushed again, and this time it _was_ from anger. But, if she was honest, she knew it wasn't all directed at him. Mostly, but not all. No, some of it was actually at herself. Of _course_ he had the city wired! It was as if a light had been shed on a dark corner of her thoughts. It explained so much, so many difficulties her rebels and she had had on past raids. It had always felt that he, somehow, had seen her coming. Because, in fact, he had.

"I don't believe this," she fumed.

His grin stretched, and there was a devious playfulness to it. "You're mad."

He sounded pleased. She wondered, for a moment, what the necklace would do if she punched him, just once, in that stupid beak of his. Instead, she took a deep breath and forced her focus onto the television, where it appeared that he hadn't lied. Morgana, along with a band of thugs, were now approaching an item—whose identity Gosalyn couldn't discern from the camera's angle—that was on a pedestal, under glass. She arched a brow. She had been trapped in this skyscraper for nearly a whole year—eight months, if her math was right—and this was the first she was hearing of Morgana personally being sent out on a mission.

"The item's magical?"

Negaduck nodded. "Powerful, too. Well, supposed to be. I told Morgana that any one of the other witches were likely to bungle it, so she ought to go."

The thugs, on the screen, were fanning out in a semicircle around the pedestal while Morgana approached it from the center of their formation. She had her hands raised, and her beak was moving. There was no sound on this feed, so Gosalyn didn't know exactly what she was saying—she could make an educated guess that it was a spell. Morgana was wiggling her fingers over the glass as she said her spell, and the feed on the camera started to wibble and get very static-y. Magic and technology never seemed to meld too well. Gosalyn turned to Negaduck, about to interrogate him on the item about to be stolen, when suddenly he slammed his fist down on the console holding the television.

"What?" he growled.

Gosalyn turned, her eyes widening. A group of masked heroes suddenly emerged, firing full scale upon Morgana and her group of thugs. Gosalyn easily picked out Blue Steel from the approaching crew, as well as a burly duck she didn't recognize. She squinted, feeling like there was something oddly familiar about his outfit. It all clicked into place for her when he fired an arrow toward Morgana. The witch transformed it into a bat with a snap of her fingers, but he was already nocking another arrow. His outfit was a perfect blend of the styles of Honker's Arrow Kit getup, and her own Quiverwing Quack. She stared closer at the build of the duck… and then she noticed his own auburn hair. Her eyes widened.

It was Tank. Of all the people to don a hero's garb… it was Tank Muddlefoot. The other three heroes were all recognizable as old members of the rebellion, but Tank was definitely a new addition. Negaduck snarled.

"This was supposed to be a quick in-and-out!"

Gosalyn watched her rebels move, going full-tilt against Negaduck's gang. They weren't letting up, firing arrow after arrow, shot after shot, punch after punch. The thugs and Morgana were falling back, quickly leaving the camera's view. Negaduck swapped screens, putting them as entering this new camera's view from the right side of the television. Then, from the left, another small group of heroes appeared, ready to fight. This crew… they were outnumbered. The shots were still being taken by the heroes, and one thug fell—a kill shot made by Tank's new hero persona. Gosalyn couldn't help but shoved a shocked hand over her beak, barely stifling a gasp. Sure, she had killed as a hero—which directly went against all of Darkwing's teachings. But it had always been a last-ditch situation, never a first choice. There had been several other options available in that moment. But Tank had chosen to kill. She shook her head.

"They're going to kill them. They're here to make sure they don't get away… ever again," she murmured.

"Morg's magic is good… but not under this level of attack. This is a damn blitz. They're dead," Negaduck said.

It wasn't exactly a nonchalant statement… nor did it have the weight it should have had on it. Gosalyn stared at the self-proclaimed King of St. Canard. His beak was pulled down into a grimace, his hands fisted on top of the console. He wasn't taking this defeat lightly. Gosalyn looked back to the screen, seeing Morgana magick a few other arrows into randomly harmless things. But it was easy to see that the witch was tiring. The heroes, on the other hand, looked as if they could go all night.

Her heart thudded in her chest. She could feel her pulse quicken, a pressure at the back of her eyes making them hurt as she fought tears. She couldn't lose Morgana. It was a hard truth to reckon with, especially with everything she knew about her father's former girlfriend. Especially after all the anger she had held for her for her betrayal of them all. But she couldn't lose her, didn't want to lose her. Despite everything, despite everything she did and wanted to feel for the witch… Morgana had been her family. Honestly, she was the last scrap of family she had left.

"There's got to be something you could do!" she snapped at Negaduck. "Surely you're not just gonna give up!"

Negaduck turned to her, somewhere between shock and rage. He gestured wildly at the screen. "What do you want from me, Gos? A miracle? Sorry, snookums, but you're barking up the wrong tree for that!"

Every muscle in her body screamed at her to hit him, just one quick punch. She quelled that instinct in light of the emergency. "You can't give her an escape plan? You don't have a way to talk to her?"

"Of course I have a way to talk to her. She's wearing an earpiece," he said, grabbing a seemingly random headset off the console and tossing it to her. "But I don't have a damn escape plan. Your precious rebels were supposed to be across town dealing with a fire that I had another one of my gangs set."

Gosalyn, for a moment, wondered what was going on in that scenario. Had this other gang still set the fire because, by her count, every fighting member of her rebellion was now at this museum. She could guess her rebels' plan… kill Negaduck's witch. She had no idea how they had found out about Morgana, since Gosalyn herself hadn't known until she had been captured. Did they have a spy within the tower? That led to a whole different set of panicked questions. But she pushed it all aside as she stared at the headset now in her hands.

"They're your rebels," Negaduck said, as if in explanation. "You know them better than anyone. Get her out."

She stared at him. She shook her head. "No. I-I-I can't."

It would be the final betrayal, wouldn't it? First, falling for Negaduck… then this. She turned away from the screen, just catching sight of a quickly tiring Morgana doing her best. There was only one thug left, who was also clearly exhausted. If she did this… and she could, honestly… then that was it, wasn't it? No turning back?

She thought of her father, wondering what Darkwing would think of his daughter now. A brief image of Honker's smiling face flashed before her eyes, followed by varied others of her rebellion against Negaduck. Then, surprisingly, Morgana's own face danced in her mind's eye, from both before Darkwing's death and more recently. She recalled the kindness with which the witch had treated her, she remembered her advice.

 _Negaduck's the law… but you could be the order_.

"She will die, Gosalyn," Negaduck growled. "You're the only one who can do this."

She closed her eyes, hugging the headset close. Breathing hard, as if she had been running, she whirled, shoving on the headset. She rolled the switch on the wire until it clicked.

"Morg, it's Gos. I can see you, so nod once if you can hear me," she said.

It was quick, but Morgana nodded. Gosalyn huffed. "Good. Now, listen close. The big guy, lobbing the arrows? I'm ninety-nine percent certain I know who he is. If that's the case, aim for his right ankle and knee. He'll go down easy."

Morgana whirled, fast as lightning, and lobbed a ball of magical injury right at Tank's right knee, as per Gosalyn's instructions. He howled, soundlessly on this feed, his face contorted in pain as he fell, his bow sliding from his grip. Tank had suffered a pretty bad football injury that had kept him from going pro. She barked at Morgana to aim at Blue Steel's left shoulder. Cecilia had hurt it during a fight against some more of Negaduck's goons a little more than a year ago. She continued to bark orders, watching with bated breath as Morgana and the thug began to make a comeback in the fight. Gosalyn was more than thankful that no kill shots had been made on the rebels, all of them just knocked down or out. Before long, they were taking out the last of the surprise attackers, and Gosalyn felt like she could breathe again.

"Get the hell out of there. _Now_ ," she said.

Negaduck looked like he was going to protest, obviously thinking about his precious item from the museum. Gosalyn jabbed a finger in his face. "My rebels never stay down for long, and that damn thing was probably a decoy planted for just this occasion anyhow. Forget it! Morgana, haul ass!"

On screen, Morgana grabbed the remaining thug by the collar of his shirt and vanished, as if she had just faded away. Gosalyn took off the headset, putting it back down on the console. She stared hard at it, unwilling to raise her eyes.

"You ordered _my_ witch out," Negaduck growled.

She pursed her beak and remained silent. She was aware of the Mallard Menace moving, and she could see, out of the corner of her eye, that he put his back to her. After a second, he turned back around, and his body language seemed a tad more relaxed.

"You got one of my gangs out," he noted.

At this, Gosalyn's head shot up. She glared. "I got Morg out."

Negaduck crossed his arms, that teasing, dark grin back on his smug face. "Who was only caught up in this because I ordered her to steal me something. You helped my gang get off scot free."

Her stomach rumbled. She felt like she was going to be sick. When she put her hands down at her sides, she realized they were shaking.

"I didn't have a choice," she mumbled.

"You could have let her die. She betrayed you by siding with me, after all."

The statements were cold and calculating. In fact, it was exactly the sort of thing the Negaduck she was more familiar with would say. That only served to deepen her revulsion. Taking one shaky step after another, she didn't stop until she was leaning against one of the posts of the bed. She grasped onto like it was the last lifesaver on a sinking ship. She nearly jumped out of her skin when she felt arms wrap around her midsection and a kiss be planted against her neck.

"You were perfect," he breathed into her ear. He planted another kiss against her neck, and Gosalyn felt like her body was going to rip in half.

She turned, facing him. He hadn't stepped back, and he hadn't removed his arms from around her. She met his eyes and forced her body to steady itself.

"I won't help you destroy the rebellion. This was a one-time only deal."

"You won't help me… _yet_."

" _Ever_."

He kissed her, and unlike the last time they had had a similar conversation, she didn't push him away. Instead, she allowed herself to fold against him, savoring the feel of him. He reached up and wound his hand in her hard, pulling. She dug her fingers into him, scratching her nails over his shoulders. He broke the kiss with a wild grin, his eyes flashing.

"You'll be my queen yet."

He didn't give her a chance to protest, smothering her words with another rough kiss. The voice that liked to scream and berate her in her head was back. But now, it whispered in a malicious hiss.

 _Monster_ …

The guilt was too much, and it felt like her very heart would burst with it. So, she squashed the voice, pulling Negaduck onto the bed. She knew she wasn't there yet, that she wouldn't let him have his victory over her tonight. Gosalyn was never one to go down without a fight. But now, she would use his kisses, his wandering touches over her body, to forget that she was falling further and further down into the darkness than she had ever planned to go. That it was okay to cling to him, for now.

 _Sure, it is,_ the voice said, dripping with sarcasm. _Keep telling yourself that_.


End file.
